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The  sotoSd'and  the  fury;  &3 
As  1  lay  dying.       1929-1946. 


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THE    MODERN    LIBRARY 
OF    THE    WORLD'S    BEST    BOOKS 


THE  SOUND  AND  THE  FURY 

& 
AS  I  LAY  DYING 


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THE  SOUND 
AND  THE  FURY 


AS  I  LAY 
DYING 

by  WILLIAM  FAULKNER 

WITH  A  NEWAPPENDIX  AS  A 
FOREWORD   BY  THE  AUTHOR 


THE 

MODERN   LIBRARY 

NEW  YORK 


COPYRIGHT,  1929,  BY  WILLIAM  FAULKNER 
COPYRIGHT,  1930,  BY  WILLIAM  FAULKNER 
COPYRIGHT,  1946,  BYRANDOM  HOUSE,  INC. 


This  Appendix  for  The  Sound  and  the  Fury 
was  written  for  The  Portable  Faulkner,  ed- 
ited by  Malcolm  Cowley,  and  is  used  here 
by  permission  of  The  Viking  Press 


Random  House  is  THE  PUBLISHER  OF 

THE    MODERN    LIBRARY 

BENNETT  A.  CERF  •  DONALD  8.  KLOPFBK  -  ROBERT  K.  HAAS 

Manufactured  in  th«  United  States  of  America 
By  H.  Wolff 


The  Sound  and  the  Fury 


THE  AND  THE 

APPENDIX 
COMPSON:  1699-1945 


IKKEMOTUBBE.  A  dispossessed  American  king, 
Called  THomme"  (and  sometimes  "de  ITiornme")  by  hi$ 
fosterbrother,  a  Chevalier  of  France,  who  had  he  not 
been  born  too  late  could  have  been  among  the  brightest 
in  that  glittering  galaxy  of  knightly  blackguards  who 
were  Napoleon's  marshals,  who  thus  translated  the  Chick* 
asaw  title  meaning  "The  Man";  which  translation  Ikke*. 
motubbe,  himself  a  man  of  wit  and  imagination  as  well 
as  a  shrewd  judge  of  character,  including  his  own,  car- 
ried one  step  further  and  anglicised  it  to  "Doom/*  Who 
granted  out  of  his  vast  lost  domain  a  solid  square  mile  of 
virgin  North  Mississippi  dirt  as  truly  angled  as  the  four 
corners  of  a  cardtable  top  (forested  then  because  these 
were  the  old  days  before  1833  when  the  stars  fell  and 
Jefferson  Mississippi  was  one  long  rambling  onestorey 
mudchinked  log  building  housing  the  Chickasaw  Agent 
and  his  tradingpost  store)  to  the  grandson  of  a  Scottish 
refugee  who  had  lost  his  own  birthright  by  casting  his 
lot  with  a  king  who  himself  had  been  dispossessed.  This 
in  partial  return  for  the  right  to  proceed  in  peace,  by 
whatever  means  he  and  his  people  saw  fit,  afoot  or 
ahorse  provided  they  were  Chickasaw  horses,  to  the  wild 
western  land  presently  to  be  called  Oklahoma:  not 
knowing  then  about  the  oil. 

JACKSON.  A  Creat  White  Father  with  a  sword. 
(An  old  duellist,  a  brawling  lean  fierce  mangy  durabla 


4  THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FURY 

imperishable  old  lion  who  set  the  wellbeing  of  the  nation 
above  the  White  House  and  the  health  of  his  new  polit- 
ical party  above  either  and  above  them  all  set  not  his 
wife's  honor  but  the  principle  that  honor  must  be  de- 
fended whether  it  was  or  not  because  defended  it  was 
whether  or  not.)  Who  patented  sealed  and  counter- 
signed the  grant  with  his  own  hand  in  his  gold  tepee  in 
Wassi  Town,  not  knowing  about  the  oil  either:  so  that 
one  day  the  homeless  descendants  of  the  dispossessed 
would  ride  supine  with  drink  and  splendidly  comatose 
above  the  dusty  allotted  harborage  of  their  bones  in  spe- 
ciallybuilt  scarletpainted  hearses  and  fire-engines. 

These  were  Compsons: 

QUENTIN    MACLACHAN.      Son      of      a      GlaSgOW 

printer,  orphaned  and  raised  by  his  mother's  people  in 
the  Perth  highlands.  Fled  to  Carolina  from  Culloden 
Moor  with  a  claymore  and  the  tartan  he  wore  by  day  and 
slept  under  by  night,  and  little  else.  At  eighty,  having 
fought  once  against  an  English  king  and  lost,  he  would 
not  make  that  mistake  twice  and  so  fled  again  one  night 
In  1779,  with  his  infant  grandson  and  the  tartan  (the  clay- 
more had  vanished,  along  with  his  son,  the  grandson's 
father,  from  one  of  Tarleton's  regiments  on  a  Georgia 
battlefield  about  a  year  ago)  into  Kentucky,  where  a 
neighbor  named  Boon  or  Boone  had  already  established 
a  settlement. 

CHARLES.  STUART.  Attainted  and  proscribed  by 
name  and  grade  in  his  British  regiment.  Left  for  dead  in 
a  Georgia  swamp  by  his  own  retreating  army  and  then 
by  the  advancing  American  one,  both  of  which  were 
wrong.  He  still  had  the  claymore  even  when  on  his  home- 


THE     SOU3STB     A2STB     THE     FIIBY  J 

made  wooden  leg  he  finally  overtook  Ms  father  and  son 
four  years  later  at  Harrodsburg,  Kentucky,  just  in  time  to 
bury  the  father  and  enter  upon  a  long  period  of  being  a 
split  personality  while  still  trying  to  be  the  schoolteacher 
which  he  believed  he  wanted  to  be,  until  he  gave  up  at 
last  and  became  the  gambler  he  actually  was  and  which 
no  Coxnpson  seemed  to  realize  they  all  were  provided 
the  gambit  was  desperate  and  the  odds  long  enough, 
Succeeded  at  last  in  risking  not  only  his  neck  but  the  se* 
curity  of  his  family  and  the  very  integrity  of  the  name  he 
would  leave  behind  him,  by  joining  the  confederation 
headed  by  an  acquaintance  named  Wilkinson  ( a  man  of 
considerable  talent  and  influence  and  intellect  and 
power)  in  a  plot  to  secede  the  whole  Mississippi  Valley 
from  the  United  States  and  join  it  to  Spain.  Fled  in  his 
turn  when  the  bubble  burst  (as  anyone  except  a  Comp- 
son  schoolteacher  should  have  known  it  would),  him-* 
self  unique  in  being  the  only  one  of  the  plotters  who  had 
to  flee  the  country:  this  not  from  the  vengeance  and  ret- 
ribution of  the  government  which  he  had  attempted  to 
dismember,  but  from  the  furious  revulsion  of  his  late  con- 
federates now  frantic  for  their  own  safety.  He  was  not 
expelled  from  the  United  States,  he  talked  himself  coun- 
tryless,  his  expulsion  due  not  to  the  treason  but  to  his 
having  been  so  vocal  and  vocif  erant  in  the  conduct  of  it, 
burning  each  bridge  vocally  behind  him  before  he  had 
even  reached  the  place  to  build  the  next  one:  so  that  it 
was  no  provost  marshal  nor  even  a  civic  agency  but  his 
late  coplotters  themselves  who  put  afoot  the  movement 
to  evict  him  from  Kentucky  and  the  United  States  ands 
if  they  had  caught  him,  probably  from  tha  world  too. 
Fled  by  night,  running  true  to  family  tradition,  with  hi® 
son  and  the  old  claymore  and  the  tartan. 


G  THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FURY 

JASON  LYCURGtrs.  Who,  driven  perhaps  by  the 
compulsion  of  the  flamboyant  name  given  him  by  the 
sardonic  embittered  woodenlegged  indomitable  father 
who  perhaps  still  believed  with  his  heart  that  what  he 
wanted  to  be  was  a  classicist  schoolteacher,  rode  up  the 
Natchez  Trace  one  day  in  1811  with  a  pair  of  fine  pistols 
and  one  meagre  saddlebag  on  a  small  lightwaisted  but 
stronghocked  mare  which  could  do  the  first  two  furlongs 
in  definitely  under  the  halfminute  and  the  next  two  in 
not  appreciably  more,  though  that  was  all.  But  it  was 
enough:  who  reached  the  Chickasaw  Agency  at  Okatoba 
(which  in  1860  was  still  called  Old  Jefferson)  and  went 
no  further.  Who  within  six  months  was  the  Agent's  clerk 
and  within  twelve  his  partner,  officially  still  the  clerk 
though  actually  halfowner  of  what  was  now  a  consider- 
able store  stocked  with  the  mare's  winnings  in  races 
against  the  horses  of  Ikkemotubbe's  young  men  which 
he,  Cornpson,  was  always  careful  to  limit  to  a  quarter  or 
at  most  three  furlongs;  and  in  the  next  year  it  was  Ikke- 
motubbe  who  owned  the  little  mare  and  Compson 
owned  the  solid  square  mile  of  land  which  someday 
would  be  almost  in  the  center  of  the  town  of  Jefferson, 
forested  then  and  still  forested  twenty  years  later  though 
rather  a  park  than  a  forest  by  that  time,  with  its  slave- 
quarters  and  stables  and  kitchengardens  and  the  forma] 
lawns  and  promenades  and  pavilions  laid  out  by  the 
same  architect  who  built  the  columned  porticoed  house 
furnished  by  steamboat  from  France  and  New  Orleans, 
and  still  the  square  intact  mile  in  1840  (with  not  only  the 
little  white  village  called  Jefferson  beginning  to  enclose 
it  but  an  entire  white  county  about  to  surround  it  be- 
cause in  a  few  years  now  Ikkemotubbe's  descendants 
and  people  would  be  gone,  those  remaining  living  not  as 
Warriors  and  hunters  but  as  white  men — as  shiftless  f aim- 


THE     SOUND     AKB     THE     FURY  7 

ers  or,  here  and  there,  the  masters  of  what  they  too 
called  plantations  and  the  owners  o£  shiftless  slaves,  a 
little  dirtier  than  the  white  man,  a  little  lazier,  a  little 
crueller — until  at  last  even  the  wild  blood  itself  would 
have  vanished,  to  be  seen  only  occasionally  in  the  nose* 
shape  of  a  Negro  on  a  cottonwagon  or  a  white  sawmill 
hand  or  trapper  or  locomotive  fireman),  known  as  the 
Compson  Domain  then,  since  now  it  was  fit  to  breed 
princes,  statesmen  and  generals  and  bishops,  to  avenge 
the  dispossessed  Compsons  from  Culloden  and  Carolina 
and  Kentucky,  then  known  as  the  Governor's  house  be- 
cause sure  enough  in  time  it  did  produce  or  at  least 
spawn  a  governor — Quentin  MacLachan  again,  after  the 
Culloden  grandfather — and  still  known  as  the  Old  Gov- 
ernor's even  after  it  had  spawned  (1861)  a  general — 
(called  so  by  predetermined  accord  and  agreement  by 
the  whole  town  and  county,  as  though  they  knew  even 
then  and  beforehand  that  the  old  governor  was  the  last 
Compson  who  would  not  fail  at  everything  he  touched 
save  longevity  or  suicide) — the  Brigadier  Jason  Lycurgus 
II  who  failed  at  Shiloh  in  '62  and  failed  again  though 
not  so  badly  at  Resaca  in  '64,  who  put  the  first  mortgage 
on  the  still  intact  square  mile  to  a  New  England  carpet- 
bagger in  '66,  after  the  old  town  had  been  burned  by  the 
Federal  General  Smith  and  the  new  little  town,  in  time 
to  be  populated  mainly  by  the  descendants  not  of  Comp- 
sons but  of  Snopeses,  had  begun  to  encroach  and  then 
nibble  at  and  into  it  as  the  failed  brigadier  spent  the  next 
forty  years  selling  fragments  of  it  off  to  keep  up  the 
mortage  on  the  remainder:  until  one  day  in  1900  he  died 
quietly  on  an  army  cot  in  the  hunting  and  fishing  camp 
in  the  Tallahatchie  Biver  bottom  where  hie  passed  most 
of  the  end  of  his  days. 


«  THE     SOXJKB     AND     THE     FUBY 

And  even  the  old  governor  was  forgotten  now;  what 
Was  left  of  the  old  square  mile  was  now  known  merely 
as  the  Compson  place — the  weedchoked  traces  of  the  old 
Jniined  lawns  and  promenades,  the  house  which  had 
needed  painting  too  long  already,  the  scaling  columns 
of  the  portico  where  Jason  III  ( bred  for  a  lawyer  and  in- 
deed he  kept  an  office  upstairs  above  the  Square,  where 
entombed  in  dusty  filingcases  some  of  the  oldest  names 
in  the  county — Holston  and  Sutpen,  Grenier  and  Beau- 
champ  and  Coldfleld — faded  year  by  year  among  the 
bottomless  labyrinths  of  chancery:  and  who  knows  what 
dream  in  the  perennial  heart  of  his  father,  now  complet- 
ing the  third  of  his  three  avatars — the  one  as  son  of  a 
brilliant  and  gallant  statesman,  the  second  as  battle- 
leader  of  brave  and  gallant  men,  the  third  as  a  sort  of 
privileged  pseudo-Daniel  Boone-Robinson  Crusoe,  who 
had  not  returned  to  juvenility  because  actually  he  had 
never  left  it — that  that  lawyer's  office  might  again  be  the 
anteroom  to  the  governor's  mansion  and  the  old  splen- 
dor) sat  all  day  long  with  a  decanter  of  whiskey  and  a 
litter  of  dogeared  Horaces  and  Livys  and  Catulluses, 
composing  (it  was  said)  caustic  and  satiric  eulogies  on 
both  his  dead  and  his  living  fellowtownsmen,  who  sold 
the  last  of  the  property,  except  that  fragment  containing 
the  house  and  the  kitchengarden  and  the  collapsing  sta- 
bles and  one  servant's  cabin  in  which  Dilsev's  family 
lived,  to  a  golf  club  for  the  ready  money  with  which  his 
daughter  Candace  could  have  her  fine  wedding  in  April 
and  his  son  Quentin  could  finish  one  year  at  Harvard 
and  commit  suicide  in  the  following  June  of  1910;  al- 
ready known  as  the  Old  Compson  place  even  while 
Ctarpsons  were  still  living  in  it  on  that  spring  dusk  in 
1928  when  the  old  governor's  doomed  lost  nameless 
seventeen-year-old  greatgreatgranddaughter  robbed  her 


THE     SOUKD     A1STB     THE     FURY  9 

last  remaining  sane  male  relative  (her  uncle  Jason  IV)  of 
bis  secret  hoard  of  money  and  climbed  down  a  rainpipe 
and  ran  off  with  a  pitchman  in  a  travelling  streetshow^ 
and  still  known  as  the  Old  Compson  place  long  after  all 
traces  of  Compsons  were  gone  from  it:  after  the  wid- 
owed mother  died  and  Jason  IV,  no  longer  needing  to 
fear  Dilsey  now,  committed  his  idiot  brother,  Benjaira% 
to  the  State  Asylum  in  Jackson  and  sold  the  house  to,  a 
countryman  who  operated  it  as  a  boarding  house  for  ju- 
ries and  horse-  and  muletraders,  and  still  known  as  the 
Old  Compson  place  even  after  the  boardinghouse  (and 
presently  the  golf  course  too)  had  vanished  and  the  old 
square  mile  was  even  intact  again  in  row  after  row  of 
small  crowded  jerrybuilt  individuallyowned  demiurbaxi 
bungalows. 

And  these: 

QtiENTJN  in.  Who  loved  not  his  sister's  "b&dy 
but  some  concept  of  Compson  honor  precariously  aad 
(he  knew  well)  only  temporarily  supported  by 
minute  fragile  membrane  of  her  maidenhead  as  a 
iature  replica  of  all  the  whole  vast  globy  earth  may 
be  poised  on  the  nose  of  a  trained  seat  Who  loved  not 
the  idea  of  the  incest  which  he  would  not  commit,  but 
some  presbyterian  concept  of  its  eternal  punishment:  het 
not  God,  could  by  that  means  cast  himself  and  his  sister 
both  into  hell,  where  he  could  guard  her  forever  and 
keep  her  forevermore  intact  amid  the  eternal  fires.  But 
who  loved  death  above  all,  who  loved  only  death,  loved 
and  lived  in  a  deliberate  and  almost  perverted  anticipa- 
tion of  death  as  a  lover  loves  and  deliberately  refrains 
from  the  waiting  willing  friendly  tender  incredible  body 
of  his  beloved,  until  he  can  no  longer  bear  not  the  re- 
fraining but  the  restraint  and  so  flings,  hurls  himself,  re< 


10    THE  SOUNB  AND  THE  FUUY 

linquishing,  drowning.  Committed  suicide  in  Cambridge 
Massachusetts,  June  1910,  two  months  after  Ms  sister's 
wedding,  waiting  first  to  complete  the  current  academic 
year  and  so  get  the  full  value  of  his  paid-in-advance  tui- 
tion, not  because  he  had  his  old  Culloden  and  Carolina 
and  Kentucky  grandfathers  in  him  but  because  the  re- 
maining piece  of  the  old  Compson  mile  which  had  been 
sold  to  pay  for  his  sister's  wedding  and  his  year  at  Har- 
vard had  been  the  one  thing,  excepting  that  same  sister 
and  the  sight  of  an  open  fire,  which  his  youngest  brother, 
born  an  idiot,  had  loved, 


(  CADDY  ).  Doomed  and  knew  it,  ac- 
cepted the  doom  without  either  seeking  or  fleeing  it. 
Loved  her  brother  despite  him,  loved  not  only  him  but 
loved  in  him  that  bitter  prophet  and  inflexible  corrupt- 
less  judge  of  what  he  considered  the  family's  honor  and 
its  doom,  as  he  thought  he  loved  but  really  hated  in  her 
what  he  considered  the  frail  doomed  vessel  of  its  pride 
and  the  foul  instrument  of  its  disgrace;  not  only  this,  she 
loved  him  not  only  in  spite  of  but  because  of  the  fact 
that  he  himself  was  incapable  of  love,  accepting  the  fact 
that  he  must  value  above  all  not  her  but  the  virginity  of 
which  she  was  custodian  and  on  which  she  placed  no 
value  whatever:  the  frail  physical  stricture  which  to  her 
was  no  more  than  a  hangnail  would  have  been.  Knew  the 
brother  loved  death  best  of  all  and  was  not  jealous, 
would  (and  perhaps  in  the  calculation  and  deliberation 
of  her  marriage  did)  have  handed  him  the  hypothetical 
hemlock.  Was  two  months  pregnant  with  another  man's 
child  which  regardless  of  what  its  sex  would  be  she  had 
already  named  Quentin  after  the  brother  whom  they 
both  (she  and  the  brother)  knew  was  already  the  same 
as  dead,  when  she  married  (1910)  an  extremely  eligible 


THE     SOTTED     AISTB     THE     FXJKY  II 

young  Indianian  she  and  her  mother  had  met  while  va- 
cationing at  French  Lick  the  summer  before.  Divorced 
by  him  1911.  Married  1920  to  a  minor  movingpicture 
magnate,  Hollywood  California.  Divorced  by  mutual 
agreement,  Mexico  1925.  Vanished  in  Paris  with  the 
German  occupation,  1940,  still  beautiful  and  probably 
still  wealthy  too  since  she  did  not  look  within  fifteen 
years  of  her  actual  fortyeight,  and  was  not  heard  of 
again.  Except  there  was  a  woman  in  Jefferson,  the  county 
librarian,  a  mousesized  and  -colored  woman  who  had 
never  married,  v/ho  had  passed  through  the  city  schools 
in  the  same  class  with  Candace  Compson  and  then  spent 
the  rest  of  her  life  trying  to  keep  Forever  Amber  in  its 
orderly  overlapping  avatars  and  Jurgen  and  Tom  Jones 
out  of  the  hands  of  the  highschool  juniors  and  seniors 
who  could  reach  them  down  without  even  having  to  tip- 
toe from  the  back  shelves  where  she  herself  would  have 
to  stand  on  a  box  to  hide  them.  One  day  in  1943,  after  a 
week  of  a  distraction  bordering  on  disintegration  almost, 
during  which  those  entering  the  library  would  find  her 
always  in  the  act  of  hurriedly  closing  her  desk  drawer 
and  turning  the  key  in  it  (so  that  the  matrons,  wives  of 
the  bankers  and  doctors  and  lawyers,  some  of  whom  had 
also  been  in  that  old  highschool  class,  who  came  and 
went  in  the  afternoons  with  the  copies  of  the  Forever 
Ambens  and  the  volumes  of  Thome  Smith  carefully 
wrapped  from  view  in  sheets  of  Memphis  and  Jackson 
newspapers,  believed  she  was  on  the  verge  of  illness  or 
perhaps  even  loss  of  mind)  she  closed  and  locked  the  li- 
brary in  the  middle  of  the  afternoon  and  with  her  hand- 
bag clasped  tightly  under  her  arm  and  two  feverish  spots 
of  determination  in  her  ordinarily  colorless  cheeks,  she 
entered  the  farmers'  supply  store  where  Jason  IV  had 
started  as  a  clerk  and  where  he  now  owned  his  own  busi- 


1*  THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FURY 

mess  as  a  buyei  of  and  dealer  In  cotton,  striding  on 
through  that  gloomy  cavern  which  only  men  ever  entered 
*— a  cavern  cluttered  and  walled  and  stalagmitehung 
with  plows  and  discs  and  loops  of  tracechain  and  single- 
%rees  and  mulecollars  and  sidemeat  and  cheap  shoes  and 
iiorselinament  and  flour  and  molasses,  gloomy  because 
the  goods  it  contained  were  not  shown  but  hidden  rather 
since  those  who  supplied  Mississippi  farmers  or  at  least 
Negro  Mississippi  fanners  for  a  share  of  the  crop  did  not 
wish,  until  that  crop  was  made  and  its  value  approxi- 
mately computable,  to  show  them  what  they  could  learn 
to  want  but  only  to  supply  them  on  specific  demand  with 
what  they  could  not  help  but  need — and  strode  on  back 
to  Jason's  particular  domain  in  the  rear:  a  railed  enclo- 
sure cluttered  with  shelves  and  pigeonholes  bearing 
spiked  dust-and-lintgathering  gin  receipts  and  ledgers 
and  cottonsamples  and  rank  with  the  blended  smell  of 
cheese  and  kerosene  and  harnessoil  and  the  tremendous 
Iron  stove  against  which  chewed  tobacco  had  been  spat 
for  almost  a  hundred  yt^ars,  and  up  to  the  long  high  slop- 
Ing  counter  behind  which  Jason  stood  and,  not  looking 
again  at  the  overalled  men  who  had  quietly  stopped  talk- 
ing and  even  chewing  when  she  entered,  with  a  kind  of 
fainting  desperation  she  opened  the  handbag  and  fum- 
bled something  out  of  it  and  laid  it  open  on  the  counter 
and  stood  trembling  and  breathing  rapidly  while  Jason 
looked  down  at  it — a  picture,  a  photograph  in  color 
clipped  obviously  from  a  slick  magazine — a  picture  filled 
with  luxury  and  money  and  sunlight — a  Cannebiere 
backdrop  of  mountains  and  palms  and  cypresses  and  the 
sea,  an  open  powerful  expensive  chromiumtrimmed 
sports  car,  the  woman's  face  hairless  between  a  rich  scarf 
and  a  seal  coat,  ageless  and  beautiful,  cold  serene  and 
damned;  beside  her  a  handsome  lean  man  of  middleage 


THE     SOU^B     AND     THE     FUHY  13 

in  the  ribbons  and  tabs  of  a  German  staffgeneral — and 
the  mousesized  mousecolored  spinster  trembling  and 
aghast  at  her  own  temerity,  staring  across  it  at  the  child- 
less bachelor  in  whom  ended  that  long  line  of  men  who 
had  had  something  in  them  of  decency  and  pride  even 
after  they  had  begun  to  fail  at  the  integrity  and  the  pride 
had  become  mostly  vanity  and  self  pity:  from  the  expatri- 
ate who  had  to  flee  his  native  land  with  little  else  except, 
his  life  yet  who  still  refused  to  accept  defeat,  through 
the  man  who  gambled  his  life  and  his  good  name  twice 
and  lost  twice  and  declined  to  accept  that  either,  and  the 
one  who  with  only  a  clever  small  quarterhorse  for  too] 
avenged  his  dispossessed  father  and  grandfather  and 
gained  a  principality,  and  the  brilliant  and  gallant  gover- 
nor and  the  general  who  though  he  failed  at  leading  in 
battle  brave  and  gallant  men  at  least  risked  his  own  life 
too  in  the  failing,  to  the  cultured  dipsomaniac  who  sold 
the  last  of  his  patrimony  not  to  buy  drink  but  to  give  one 
of  his  descendants  at  least  the  best  chance  in  life  he 
could  think  of. 

It's  Caddy!'  the  librarian  whispered.  We  must  save 
her!' 

It's  Cad,  all  right/  Jason  said.  Then  he  began  to  laugh. 
He  stood  there  laughing  above  the  picture,  above  file 
cold  beautiful  face  now  creased  and  dogeared  from  its 
week's  sojourn  in  the  desk  drawer  and  the  handbag.  And 
the  librarian  knew  why  he  was  laughing,  who  had  not 
called  him  anything  but  Mr  Compson  for  thirty-two 
years  now,  ever  since  the  day  in  1911  when  Candace,  casl 
off  by  her  husband,  had  brought  her  infant  daughtei 
Jiome  and  left  the  child  and  departed  by  the  next  train, 
to  return  no  more,  and  not  only  the  Negro  cook,  Dilsey, 
but  the  librarian  too  divined  by  simple  instinct  thai 
Jason  was  somehow  using  the  child's  life  and  its  illegiti 


14          THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FTJ&Y 

macy  both  to  blackmail  the  mother  not  only  into  staying 
away  from  Jefferson  for  the  rest  of  her  life  but  into  ap^ 
pointing  him  sole  unchallengeable  trustee  of  the  money 
she  would  send  for  the  child's  maintenance,  and  had  re- 
fused to  speak  to  him  at  all  since  that  day  in  1928  when 
the  daughter  climbed  down  the  rainpipe  and  ran  away 
with  the  pitchman. 

'Jason!'  she  cried.  °We  must  save  her!  Jason!  Jason!' 

%nd  still  crying  it  even  when  he  took  up  the  picture  be- 
tween thumb  and  finger  and  threw  it  back  across  the 
counter  toward  her. 

That  Candace?'  he  said.  T)ont  make  me  laugh.  This 
bitch  aint  thirty  yet.  The  other  one's  fifty  now/ 

And  the  library  was  still  locked  all  the  next  day  too 
when  at  three  oclock  in  the  afternoon,  footsore  and  spent 
yet  still  unflagging  and  still  clasping  the  handbag  tightly 
under  her  arm,  she  turned  into  a  neat  small  yard  in  the 
Negro  residence  section  of  Memphis  and  mounted  the 
steps  of  the  neat  small  house  and  rang  the  bell  and  the 
door  opened  and  a  black  woman  of  about  her  own  age 
looked  quietly  out  at  her.  It's  Frony,  isn't  it?'  the  librar- 
ian said.  TDont  you  remember  me Melissa  Meek, 

from  Jefferson * 

'Yes,*  the  Negress  said.  'Come  in.  You  want  to  see 
Mania/  And  she  entered  the  room,  the  neat  yet  cluttered 
bedroom  of  an  old  Negro,  rank  with  the  smell  of  old  peo- 
ple, old  women,  old  Negroes,  where  the  old  woman  her- 
self sat  in  a  rocker  beside  the  hearth  where  even  though 
it  was  June  a  fire  smoldered — a  big  woman  once,  in  faded 
clean  calico  and  an  immaculate  turban  wound  round  her 
head  above  the  bleared  and  now  apparently  almost  sight- 
less eyes — and  put  the  dogeared  clipping  into  the  black 
liands  which,  like  the  women  of  her  race,  were  still  as 


THE     SOUND     AND     THE     1"|JBY  1$ 

supple  and  delicately  shaped  as  they  had  been  when  she 
Was  thirty  or  twenty  or  even  seventeen. 

It's  Caddy!'  the  librarian  said.  It  is!  Dilsey!  Dilseyi* 

What  did  he  say?'  the  old  Negress  said.  And  the  li 
brarian  knew  whom  she  meant  by  lie',  nor  did  the  librar- 
ian marvel,  not  only  that  the  old  Negress  would  know 
that  she  (the  librarian)  would  know  whom  she  meant  by 
the  Tie',  but  that  the  old  Negress  would  know  at  once 
that  she  had  already  shown  the  picture  to  Jason. 

Dont  you  know  what  he  said?'  she  cried.  "When  he 
realised  she  was  in  danger,  he  said  it  was  her,  even  if  I 
hadn't  even  had  a  picture  to  show  him.  But  as  soon  as  he 
realised  that  somebody,  anybody,  even  just  me,  wanted 
to  save  her,  would  try  to  save  her,  he  said  it  wasn't.  But 
it  is!  Look  at  it!" 

*Look  at  my  eyes/  the  old  Negress  said.  'How  can  I  see 
that  picture?' 

"Call  Frony!'  the  librarian  cried.  'She  will  know  her!1 
But  already  the  old  Negress  was  folding  the  clipping 
carefully  back  into  its  old  creases,  handing  it  back. 

*My  eyes  aint  any  good  anymore/  she  said,  *L  cant  see 
it* 

And  that  was  all.  At  six  oclock  she  fought  her  way 
through  the  crowded  bus  terminal,  the  bag  clutched  un^ 
der  one  arm  and  the  return  half  of  her  rouiidtrip  ticket 
in  the  other  hand,  and  was  swept  out  onto  the  roaring 
platf orm  on  the  diurnal  tide  of  a  few  middleaged  civilians 
but  mostly  soldiers  and  sailors  enroute  either  to  leave  or 
to  death  and  the  homeless  young  women,,  their  compan- 
ions, who  for  two  years  now  had  lived  from  day  to  day 
in  pullrnans  and  hotels  when  they  were  lucky  and  in  day- 
coaches  and  busses  and  stations  and  lobbies  and  public 
restrooms  when  not,  pausing  only  long  enough  to  drop 


I<y          THE,     SOTJKD     AKD     THE     FUUY 

their  foals  in  charity  wards  or  policestations  and  then 
move  on  again,  and  fought  her  way  into  the  bus,  smaller 
than  any  other  there  so  that  her  feet  touched  the  floor 
only  occasionally  until  a  shape  (a  man  in  khaki;  she 
Couldn't  see  him  at  all  because  she  was  already  crying) 
rose  and  picked  her  up  bodily  and  set  her  into  a  seat 
next  the  window,  where  still  crying  quietly  she  could 
look  out  upon  the  fleeing  city  as  it  streaked  past  and  then 
was  behind  and  presently  now  she  would  be  home  again, 
safe  in  Jefferson  where  life  lived  too  with  all  its  incom- 
prehensible passion  and  turmoil  and  grief  and  fury  and 
despair,  but  here  at  six  odock  you  could  close  the  covers 
on  it  and  even  the  weightless  hand  of  a  child  could  put 
it  back  among  its  unfeatured  kindred  on  the  quiet  eter- 
nal shelves  and  turn  the  key  upon  it  for  the  whole  and 
dreamless  night.  Yes  she  thought,  crying  quietly  that  was 
it  she  didn't  want  to  see  it  know  whether  it  was  Caddy 
&r  not  because  she  knows  Caddy  doesn't  want  to  be 
saved  hasnt  anything  anymore  worth  being  saved  for 
nothing  worth  being  lost  that  she  can  lose 

JASON  IV.  The  first  sane  Compson  since  before  Cul- 
loden  and  (a  childless  bachelor)  hence  the  last.  Logical 
rational  contained  and  even  a  philosopher  in  the  old  stoic 
tradition:  thinking  nothing  whatever  of  God  one  way  or 
the  other  and  simply  considering  the  police  and  so  fear- 
ing and  respecting  only  the  Negro  woman,  his  sworn  en- 
emy since  his  birth  and  his  mortal  one  since  that  day  in 
1911  when  she  too  divined  by  simple  clairvoyance  that 
he  was  somehow  using  his  infant  niece's  illegitimacy  to 
blackmail  its  mother,  who  cooked  the  food  he  ate.  Who 
not  only  fended  off  and  held  his  own  with  Compsons  but 
competed  and  held  his  own  with  the  Snopeses  who  took 
over  the  little  town  following  the  turn  of  the  century  as 


THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FTJEY          *7 

the  Compsons  and  Sartorises  and  their  ilk  faded  from  it 
(no  Snopes,  but  Jason  Compson  himself  who  as  soon  as 
Ms  mother  died — the  niece  had  already  climbed  down 
the  rainpipe  and  vanished  so  Dilsey  no  longer  had  either 
of  these  clubs  to  hold  over  him — committed  his  idiot 
younger  brother  to  the  state  and  vacated  the  old  house, 
first  chopping  up  the  vast  oncesplendid  rooms  into  what 
he  called  apartments  and  selling  the  whole  thing  to  a 
countryman  who  opened  a  boardinghouse  in  it),  though 
this  was  not  difficult  since  to  him  all  the  rest  of  the  town 
and  the  world  and  the  human  race  too  except  himself 
were  Compsons,  inexplicable  yet  quite  predictable  in  that 
they  were  in  no  sense  whatever  to  be  trusted.  Who,  all 
the  money  from  the  sale  of  the  pasture  having  gone  for 
his  sister's  wedding  and  his  brother's  course  at  Harvard, 
used  his  own  niggard  savings  out  of  his  meagre  wages  as 
a  storeclerk  to  send  himself  to  a  Memphis  school  where 
he  learned  to  class  and  grade  cotton,  and  so  established 
his  own  business  with  which,  following  his  dipsomaniac 
father's  death,  he  assumed  the  entire  burden  of  the  rot- 
ting family  in  the  rotting  house,  supporting  his  idiot 
brother  because  of  their  mother,  sacrificing  what  pleas- 
ures might  have  been  the  right  and  just  due  and  even  the 
necessity  of  a  thirty-year-old  bachelor,  so  that  his 
mother's  life  might  continue  as  nearly  as  possible  to  what 
it  had  been;  this  not  because  he  loved  her  but  (a  sane 
man  always )  simply  because  he  was  afraid  of  the  Negro 
cook  whom  he  could  not  even  force  to  leave,  even  when 
he  tried  to  stop  paying  her  weekly  wages;  and  who  de- 
spite all  this,  still  managed  to  save  almost  three  thousand 
dollars  ($2840.50  as  he  reported  it  on  the  night  his  niece 
stole  it;  in  niggard  and  agonised  dimes  and  quarters  and 
halfdollars,  which  hoard  he  kept  in  no  bank  because  to 
him  a  banker  too  was  just  one  more  Compson,  but  hid 


18  THE     SOUND     A3STB     THE     FX/JSttf 

in  a  locked  bureau  drawer  in  his  bedroom  whose  bed  1&® 
made  and  changed  himself  since  he  kept  the  bedroom 
door  locked  all  the  time  save  when  he  was  passing 
through  it.  Who,  following  a  fumbling  abortive  attempt 
by  his  idiot  brother  on  a  passing  female  child,  had  him- 
self appointed  the  idiot's  guardian  without  letting  their 
mother  know  and  so  was  able  to  have  the  creature  cas- 
trated before  the  mother  even  knew  it  was  out  of  the 
house,  and  who  following  the  mother's  death  in  1933  was 
able  to  free  himself  forever  not  only  from  the  idiot 
brother  and  the  house  but  from  the  Negro  woman  too, 
moving  into  a  pair  of  offices  up  a  flight  of  stairs  above 
the  supplystore  containing  his  cotton  ledgers  and  sam- 
ples, which  he  had  converted  into  a  bedroom-kitchen- 
bath,  m  and  out  of  which  on  weekends  there  would  be 
seer?  a  big  plain  friendly  brazenhaired  pleasantfaced 
woman  no  longer  very  young,  in  round  picture  hats  and 
(in  its  season)  an  imitation  fur  coat,  the  two  of  them,  the 
middleaged  cottonbuyer  and  the  woman  whom  the  town 
called,  simply,  his  friend  from  Memphis,  seen  at  the  local 
picture  show  on  Saturday  night  and  on  Sunday  morning 
mounting  the  apartment  stairs  with  paper  bags  from  the 
grocer's  containing  loaves  and  eggs  and  oranges  and  cans 
of  soup,  domestic,  uxorious,  connubial,  until  the  late  aft- 
ernoon bus  carried  her  back  to  Memphis.  He  was  eman- 
cipated now.  He  was  free.  In  1865,*  he  would  say,  'Abe 
Lincoln  freed  the  niggers  from  the  Coinpsons.  In  1933, 
Jason  Coinpson  freed  the  Compsons  from  the  niggers/ 

BENJAMIN.  Born  Maury,  after  his  mother's  only 
brother:  a  handsome  flashing  swaggering  workless 
bachelor  who  borrowed  money  from  almost  anyone,  even 
Dilsey  although  she  was  a  Negro,  explaining  to  her  as  he 
withdrew  his  hand  from  his  pocket  that  she  was  not  only 


THE     SOUND     AJXD     THE     FURY  19 

in  his  eyes  the  same,  as  a  member  of  Bis  sister's  family, 
she  would  be  considered  a  born  lady  anywhere  in  any 
eyes.  Who,  when  at  last  even  his  mother  realised  what  he 
was  and  insisted  weeping  that  his  name  must  be 
changed,  was  rechristened  Benjamin  by  his  brother 
Quentin  (Benjamin,  our  lastbom,  sold  into  Egypt).  Who 
loved  three  things:  the  pasture  which  was  sold  to  pay  for 
Candace's  wedding  and  to  sendj^uentin  Jto  HaxvagL  his 
sister  Candaceg^firgHghfa  Who  lost  none  of  them  because 
he  could  not  remember  his  sister  but  only  the  loss  of  her, 
and  firelight  was  the  same  bright  shape  as  going  to  sleeps 
and  the  pasture  was  even  better  sold  than  before  because 
now  he  and  TP  could  not  only  follow  timeless  along  the 
fence  the  motions  which  it  did  not  even  matter  to  him 
were  humanbeings  swinging  golfsticks,  TP  could  lead 
them  to  clumps  of  grass  or  weeds  where  there  would  ap- 
pear suddenly  in  XB's  hand  .smaJl-^feite-sph^^ 
competed  with  and  even  conquered  what  he  did  not 
even  know  was  gravity  and  all  the  immutable  laws  when 
released  from  the  hand^  toward  plank  floor.  .QX  .^nipke* 
house  wall  or  c<crswalk.  Gelded  1913.  Commit- 


^ 

ted  to  die~?tafe"Asylum,  Jackson  1933.  Lost  nothing  then 
elffiSn^e^^  not  the 

pasture  but  only  its  loss,  and  firelight  wa£  still  the  same 
bright  shape  of  sleep. 

QUENTIN.  The  last.  Candace's  daughter.  Fatherless 
Bine  months  before  her  birth,  nameless  at  birth  and  al- 
ready doomed  to  be  unwed  from  the  instant  riie  dividing 
egg  determined  its  sex.  Who  at  seventeen,  on  the  one 
thousand  eight  hundred  ninetyfifth  anniversary  of  the  day 
before  the  resurrection  of  Our  Lord,  swung  herself  by  a 
rainpipe  from  the  window  of  the  room  in  which  hex 
uncle  had  locked  her  at  noon,  to  the  locked  window  of 


20          THE     SOITKD     'AND     THE     FURY 

his  own  locked  and  empty  bedroom  and  broke  a  pane 
and  entered  the  window  and  with  the  uncle's  firepoker 
burst  open  the  locked  bureau  drawer  and  took  the  money 
(it  was  not  $2840.50  either,  it  was  almost  seven  thou- 
sand dollars  and  this  was  Jason's  rage,  the  red  unbear- 
able fury  which  on  that  night  and  at  intervals  recurring 
with  little  or  no  diminishment  for  the  next  five  years, 
made  him  seriously  believe  would  at  some  unwarned  in- 
stant destroy  him,  kill  him  as  instantaneously  dead  as  a 
bullet  or  a  iightningbolt:  that  although  he  had  been 
robbed  not  of  a  mere  petty  three  thousand  dollars  but  of 
almost  seven  thousand  he  couldn't  even  tell  anybody;  be- 
cause he  had  been  robbed  of  seven  thousand  dollars  in- 
stead of  just  three  he  could  not  only  never  receive  justifi- 
cation —  he  did  not  want  sympathy  —  from  other  men 
unlucky  enough  to  have  one  bitch  for  a  sister  and  another 
for  a  niece,  he  couldn't  even  go  to  the  police;  because  he 
had  lost  four  thousand  dollars  which  did  not  belong  to 
him  he  couldn't  even  recover  the  three  thousand  which 
did  since  those  first  four  thousand  dollars  were  not  only 
the  legal  property  of  his  niece  as  a  part  of  the  money  sup- 
plied for  her  support  and  maintenance  by  her  mother 
over  the  last  sixteen  years,  they  did  not  exist  at  all,  hav- 
ing been  officially  recorded  as  expended  and  consumed 
in  the  annual  reports  he  submitted  to  the  district  Chan- 
cellor, as  required  of  him  as  guardian  and  trustee  by  his 
bondsmen:  so  that  he  had  been  robbed  not  onl^of  Jos 
but  his  ^savings  too,  and"""6yliis^^  he 


^ 

had  been  robbed  not  only  of  the  four  thousand  dollars 
which  he  had  risked  jail  to  acquire  but  of  the  three  thou- 
sand which  he  had  hoarded  at  the  price  of  sacrifice  and 
denial,  almost  a  nickel  and  a  dime  at  a  time,  over  a  period 
of  almost  twenty  years:  and  this  not  only  by  his  own  vie- 


THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FURY          M 

tim  but  by  a  child  who  did  it  at  one  blow,  without  pie* 
meditation  or  plan,  not  even  knowing  or  even  caring  bow 
much  she  would  find  when  she  broke  the  drawer  open; 
and  now  he  couldn't  even  go  to  the  police  for  help:  he 
who  had  considered  the  police  always,  never  given  them 
any  trouble,  had  paid  the  taxes  for  years  which  sup- 
ported them  in  parasitic  and  ^ai§ii£»^^S2S.>  no^  onV 
that,  he  didn't  dare  pursue  the  girl  himself  because  hf. 
might  catch  her  and  she  would  talk,  so  that  his  only  re- 
course was  a  vain  dream  which  kept  him  tossing  and 
sweating  on  nights  two  and  three  and  even  four  years 
after  the  event,  when  he  should  have  forgotten  about  it; 


before  she  had  spent  all  the  money,  and 
iniarder  her  before  she  had^tme  toopen  her  mouth)  and 
climbed  down  the  same  rainpipem^tET^Husk  and  ran 
away  with  the  pitchman^  who  was  already  under  sentence 
j  Arid  so  vanished;  whatever  occupation  over- 


took her  would  have  arrived  in  no  chromium  Mercedes; 
whatever  snapshot  would  have  contained  no  general  of 
staff. 

And  that  was  all.  These  others  were  not  Compsons. 
They  were  black: 

TP.  Who  wore  on  Memphis's  Beale  Street  the  fine 
bright  cheap  intransigent  clothes  manufactured  specifi" 
cally  for  him  by  the  owners  of  Chicago  and  New  York 
sweatshops. 

FRONT.  Who  married  a  pullman  porter  and  went  to 
St  Louis  to  live  and  later  moved  back  to  Memphis  to 
make  a  home  for  her  mother  since  Dilsey  refused  to  go 
further  than  that. 


22  THE     SOUND     A1STD      THE     FUBY 

LUSTER.  A  man,  aged  14.  Who  was  not  only 
capable  of  the  complete  care  and  security  of  an  idiot 
twice  his  age  and  three  times  his  size,  but  could  keep  him 
entertained. 


D  i  L  s  E  Y. 
They  endured* 


APRIL 

7 

1928 


f  I  THROUGH  THE  FENCE,  BETWEEN  THUS  CURLING  FLOWER 
JL  spaces,  I  could  see  them  hitting.  They  were  coming 
toward  where  the  flag  was  and  I  went  along  the  fence. 
Luster  was  hunting  in  the  grass  by  the  flower  tree.  They 
took  the  flag  out,  and  they  were  hitting.  Then  they  put 
the  flag  back  and  they  went  to  the  table,  and  he  hit  and 
the  other  hit.  Then  they  went  on,  and  I  went  along  the 
fence.  Luster  came  away  from  the  flower  tree  and  we 
went  along  the  fence  and  they  stopped  and  we  stopped 
and  I  looked  through  the  fence  while  Luster  was  hunt- 
ing in  the  grass. 

"Here,  caddie."  He  hit.  They  went  away  across  the  pas- 
ture. I  held  to  the  fence  and  watched  them  going  away. 

"Listen  at  you,  now/'  Luster  said.  "Aint  you  something, 
thirty-three  years  old,  going  on  that  way.  After  I  done 
went  all  the  way  to  town  to  buy  you  that  cake.  Hush  up 
that  moaning.  Aint  you  going  to  help  me  find  that  quar- 
ter so  I  can  go  to  the  show  tonight." 

They  were  hitting  little,  across  the  pasture.  I  went 
along  the  fence  to  where  the  flag  was.  It  flapped  on  the 
bright  grass  and  the  trees. 


24  THE     SOUND     A3STD     THE     FURY 

"Come  on."  Luster  said.  "We  done  looked  there.  They 
aint  no  more  coming  right  now.  Lets  go  down  to  the 
branch  and  find  that  quarter  before  them  niggers  finds 
it." 

It  was  red?  flapping  on  the  pasture.  Then- there  was  a 
bird  slanting  and  tilting  on  it.  Luster  threw.  The  flag 
flapped  on  the  bright  grass  and  the  trees.  I  held  to  the 
fence. 

"Shut  up  that  moaning."  Luster  said.  "I  cant  make 
them  come  if  they  aint  coming,  can  I.  If  you  dont  hush 
up,  mammy  aint  going  to  have  no  birthday  for  you.  If 
you  dont  hush,  you  know  what  I  going  to  do.  I  going  to 
eat  that  cake  all  up.  Eat  them  candles,  too.  Eat  all  them 
thirty-three  candles.  Come  on,  let's  go  down  to  the 
branch.  I  got  to  find  my  quarter.  Maybe  we  can  find  one 
©f  they  balls.  Here.  Here  they  is.  Way  over  yonder.  See." 
He  came  to  the  fence  and  pointed  his  arm.  "See  them. 
They  aint  coming  back  here  no  more.  Come  on." 

We  went  along  the  fence  and  came  to  the  garden 
fence,  where  our  shadows  were.  My  shadow  was  higher 
than  Luster's  on  the  fence.  We  came  to  the  broken  place 
and  went  through  it. 

"Wait  a  minute."  Luster  said.  "You  snagged  on  that  nail 
again.  Cant  you  never  crawl  through  here  without  snag- 
ging on  that  nail." 

Caddy  uncaught  me  and  we  crawled  through.  Uncle 
Maury  said  to  not  let  anybody  see  us,  so  we  better  stoop 
over,  Caddy  said.  Stoop  over,  Benjy.  Like  this,  see.  We 
stooped  over  and  crossed  the  garden,  where  the  flowers 
rasped  and  rattled  against  us.  The  ground  was  hard.  We 
climbed  the  -fence,  where  the  pigs  were  grunting  and 
snuffing.  I  expect  they're  sorry  because  one  of  them  got 
killed  today,  Caddy  said.  The  ground  was  hard,  churned 
and  knotted. 


THE     SOUKB     A3SFB     THE     FURY  2$ 

they  II  get  froze.  You  dont  wank  your  hands  froze  ot* 
Christmas,  do  you. 

"If  s  too  cold  out  there."  Versh  said.  "You  dont  want  to 
go  out  doors." 

"What  is  it  now."  Mother  said. 

"He  want  to  go  out  doors/'  Versh  said. 

"Let  him  go/*  Uncle  Maury  said. 

"It's  too  cold."  Mother  said.  "He'd  better  stay  in.  Benja- 
min. Stop  that,  now/' 

"It  wont  hurt  him."  Uncle  Maury  said. 

"You,  Benjamin."  Mother  said.  "If  you  dont  be  good, 
youll  have  to  go  to  the  kitchen." 

"Mammy  say  keep  him  out  the  kitchen  today."  Versh 
saici.  "She  say  she  got  all  that  cooking  to  get  done." 
.     "Let  him  go,  Caroline."  Uncle  Maury  said.  "You'  11  worry 
yourself  sick  over  him/' 

"I  know  it."  Mother  said.  "It's  a  judgment  on  me.  I 
sometimes  wonder." 

"I  know,  I  know."  Uncle  Maury  said.  "You  must  keep 
your  strength  up.  Ill  make  you  a  toddy." 

"It  just  upsets  me  that  much  more."  Mother  said.  "Dont 
you  know  it  does." 

"Youll  feel  better."  Uncle  Maury  said.  "Wrap  him  up 
good,  boy,  and  take  him  out  for  a  while." 

Uncle  Maury  went  away.  Versh  went  away. 

"Please  hush."  Mother  said.  "We're  trying  to  get  you 
out  as  fast  as  we  can.  I  dont  want  you  to  get  sick." 

Versh  put  my  overshoes  and  overcoat  on  and  we  took 
my  cap  and  went  out.  Uncle  Maury  was  putting  the  bot* 
tie  away  in  the  sideboard  in  the  dining-room. 

"Keep  him  out  about  half  an  hour,  boy."  Uncle  Maury 
said.  "Keep  him  in  the  yard,  now." 

"Yes,  sir."  Versh  said.  <0We  dont  never  let  him  get  ofi 
the  place." 

W?  went  out  doors.  The  sun  was  cold  and  bright, 


16  THE     SOUND     AKB     THE     FU&Y 

"Where  you  heading  for/*  Versh  said.  "You  dont  think 
you  going  to  town,  does  you."  We  went  through  the  rat- 
tling leaves.  The  gate  was  cold.  "You  better  keep  them 
hands  in  your  pockets/*  Versh  said,  "You  get  them  froze 
onto  that  gate,  then  what  you  do.  Whyn*t  you  wait  for 
them  in  the  house."  He  put  my  hands  into  my  pockets.  I 
could  hear  him  rattling  in  the  leaves.  I  could  smell  the 
cold.  The  gate  was  cold. 

"Here  some  hickeynuts.  Whooey.  Git  up  that  tree.  Look 
here  at  this  squirl,  Benjy/* 

I  couldn't  feel  the  gate  at  all,  but  I  could  smell  the 
bright  cold. 

'TTou  better  put  them  hands  back  in  your  pockets/* 

Caddy  was  walking.  Then  she  was  running,  her  book* 
satchel  swinging  and  jouncing  behind  her. 

"Hello,  Benjy/*  Caddy  said.  She  opened  the  gate  and 
came  in  and  stooped  down.  Caddy  smelled  like  leaves. 
"Did  you  come  to  meet  me.**  she  said.  "Did  you  come  to 
meet  Caddy.  What  did  you  let  him  get  his  hands  so  cold 
for,  Versh/* 

"I  told  him  to  keep  them  in  his  pockets/*  Versh  said. 
"Holding  onto  that  ahun  gate." 

"Did  you  come  to  meet  Caddy/*  she  said,  rubbing  my 
hands.  "What  is  it  What  are  you  trying  to  tell  Caddy/* 
Caddy  smelled  like  trees  and  like  when  she  says  we  were 
asleep. 

What  are  you  moaning  about,  Luster  said.  You  can 
watch  them  again  when  we  get  to  the  branch.  Here. 
Heres  you  a  jimson  weed.  He  gave  me  the  flower.  We 
went  through  the  fence,  into  the  lot. 

"What  is  it/*  Caddy  said.  ""What  are  you  trying  to  tell 
Caddy.  Did  they  send  him  out,  Versh/* 

"Couldn't  keep  him  in.**  Versh  said.  "He  kept  on  until 
they  let  him  go  and  he  come  right  straight  down  heres 
looking  through  the  gate." 


THE      SOUjSTD      AND     THE      FURY  */ 

"What  is  it."  Caddy  said.  "Did  you  think  it  would  be 
Christmas  vrhen  I  came  home  from  school.  Is  that  what 
you  thought.  Christmas  is  the  day  after  tomorrow.  Santy 
Glaus,  Benjy.  Santy  Claus.  Come  on,  let's  run  to  the 
house  and  get  warm."  She  took  my  hand  and  we  ran 
through  the  bright  rustling  leaves.  We  ran  up  the  steps 
and  out  of  the  bright  cold,  into  the  dark  cold.  Uncle 
Maury  was  putting  the  bottle  back  in  the  sideboard.  He 
called  Caddy.  Caddy  said, 

'Take  him  in  to  the  fire,  Versh.  Go  with  Versa."  she 
said.  "I'll  come  in  a  minute." 

We  went  to  the  fire.  Mother  said, 

"Is  he  cold,  Versh." 

"Nome."  Versh  said. 

"Take  his  overcoat  and  overshoes  off."  Mother  said, 
<cHow  many  times  do  I  have  to  tell  you  not  to  bring  him 
into  the  house  with  his  overshoes  on." 

"Yessum."  Versh  said.  "Hold  still,  now."  He  took  my 
overshoes  off  and  unbuttoned  my  coat.  Caddy  said, 

"Wait,  Versh.  Cant  he  go  out  again,  Mother.  I  want 
him  to  go  with  me." 

"You'd  better  leave  him  here."  Uncle  Maury  said.  "He's 
been  out  enough  today." 

"I  think  you'd  both  better  stay  in."  Mother  said.  "It's 
getting  colder,  Dilsey  says." 

"Oh,  Mother."  Caddy  said. 

"Nonsense/'  Uncle  Maury  said.  "She's  been  in  school 
all  day.  She  needs  the  fresh  air.  Run  along,  Candace." 

"Let  him  go,  Mother."  Caddy  said.  "Please.  You  know 
hell  cry." 

"Then  why  did  you  mention  it  before  him."  Mother 
said.  'Why  did  you  come  in  here.  To  give  him  some  ex- 
cuse to  worry  me  again.  You've  been  out  enough  today 
I  think  you'd  better  sit  down  here  and  play  with  him/* 

"Let  them  go,  Caroline."  Uncle  Maury  said.  "A  litdf 


28     THE  SOUND  AND  THE  FURY 

cold  wont  hurt  them.  Remember,  youVe  got  to  keep  yom 
strength,  up." 

"I  know."  Mother  said.  "Nobody  knows  how  I  dread 
Christmas.  Nobody  knows.  I  am  not  one  of  those  women 
who  can  stand  things.  I  wish  for  Jason's  and  the  chil- 
dren^ sakes  I  was  stronger/* 

"You  must  do  the  best  you  can  and  not  let  them  worry 
you/*  Uncle  Maury  said.  "Run  along,  you  two.  But  dont 
stay  out  long,  now.  Your  mother  will  worry/' 

"Yes,  sir.''  Caddy  said.  "Come  on,  Benjy.  We're  going 
out  doors  again/'  She  buttoned  my  coat  and  we  went  to- 
ward the  door. 

"Are  you  going  to  take  that  baby  out  without  his  over- 
shoes/' Mother  said.  "Do  you  want  to  make  him  sick, 
with  the  house  full  of  company." 

"I  forgot/'  Caddy  said.  "I  thought  he  had  them  on." 

We  went  back.  "You  must  think/'  Mother  said.  Hold 
still  now  Versh  said.  He  put  my  overshoes  on.  "Someday 
I'll  be  gone,  and  you'll  have  to  think  for  him."  Now  stomp 
Versh  said.  "Come  here  and  kiss  Mother,  Benjamin." 

Caddy  took  me  to  Mother's  chair  and  Mother  took  my 
face  in  her  hands  and  then  she  held  me  against  her. 

"My  poor  baby/'  she  said.  She  let  me  go.  "You  and 
Versh  take  good  care  of  him,  honey." 

"Yessum."  Caddy  said.  We  went  out.  Caddy  said, 

"You  needn't  go,  Versh.  I'll  keep  him  for  a  while/' 

"All  right."  Versh  said.  "I  aint  going  out  in  that  cold  for 
no  fun/'  He  went  on  and  we  stopped  in  the  hall  and 
Caddy  knelt  and  put  her  arms  around  me  and  her  cold 
blight  face  against  mine.  She  srnelled  like  trees. 

"You're  not  a  poor  baby.  Are  you.  You've  got  your 
Caddy.  Haven't  you  got  your  Caddy." 

Cant  you  shut  up  that  moaning  and  clobbering,  Lustef 
$aid.  Aint  you  shamed  of  yourself,  making  all  this  rackei* 


THE     SOUND     ANB     THE     FURY  2$ 

We  passed  the  carriage  house,  whene  the  carnage  was.  If 
had  a  new  wheel, 

"Git  in,  now,  and  set  still  until  your  maw  come."  Dilsey 
said.  She  shoved  me  into  the  carriage.  T.  P.  held  the 
reins.  "  'Clare  I  don't  see  how  come  Jason  wont  get  a  new 
surrey."  Dilsey  said.  "This  thing  going  to  fall  to  pieces  un- 
der you  all  some  day.  Look  at  them  wheels." 

Mother  came  out,  pulling  her  veil  down.  She  had  some 
flowers. 

"Where's  Roskus."  she  said. 

"Roskus  cant  lift  his  arms,  today."  Dilsey  said.  "T,  P. 
can  drive  all  right." 

"I'm  afraid  to."  Mother  said.  "It  seems  to  me  you  all 
could  furnish  me  with  a  driver  for  the  carriage  once  a 
week.  It's  little  enough  I  ask,  Lord  knows." 

"You  know  just  as  well  as  me  that  Roskus  got  the  rheu- 
matism too  bad  to  do  more  than  he  have  to,  Miss  Cah- 
line."  Dilsey  said.  "You  come  on  and  get  in,  now.  T.  P. 
can  drive  you  just  as  good  as  Roskus." 

Tm  afraid  to."  Mother  said.  "With  the  baby." 

Dilsey  went  up  the  steps.  "You  calling  that  thing  a 
baby,"  she  said.  She  took  Mother's  arm.  "A  man  big  as 
T.  P.  Come  on,  now,  if  you  going." 

"I'm  afraid  to."  Mother  said.  They  came  down  the 
steps  and  Dilsey  helped  Mother  in.  "Perhaps  Ml  be  the 
best  thing,  for  all  of  us."  Mother  said. 

"Aint  you  shamed,  talking  that  way.'*  Dilsey  said, 
"Don't  you  know  it'll  take  more  than  a  eighteen  year  old 
nigger  to  make  Queenie  run  away.  She  older  than  him 
and  Benjy  put  together.  And  dont  you  start  no  projeck- 
ing  with  Queenie,  you  hear  n?e,  T.  P.  If  you  dont  drive 
to  suit  Miss  Cahline,  I  going  to  put  Roskus  on  you.  He 
aint  too  tied  up  to  do  that." 

"Yessum."  T.  P.  said. 


30     THE  SOUND  AND  THE  FURY 

"I  just  know  something  will  happen."  Mother  said, 
"Stop,  Benjamin.'* 

"'Give  him  a  flower  to  hold/'  Dilsey  said,  "That  what  he 
wanting."  She  reached  her  hand  in. 

"No,  no."  Mother  said.  "You'll  have  them  all  scattered/' 

"You  hold  them."  Dilsey  said.  Ill  get  him  one  out." 
She  gave  me  a  flower  and  her  hand  went  away. 

"Go  on  now,  "fore  Quentin  see  you  and  have  to  go 
too."  Dilsey  said. 

"Where  is  she.**  Mother  said. 

"She  down  to  the  house  playing  with  Luster,"  Dilsey 
said.  "Go  on,  T.  P.  Drive  that  surrey  like  Roskus  told  you, 
now." 

"Yessran ."  T.  P.  said.  "Hum  up,  Queenie." 

"Quentin."  Mother  said.  "Don't  let" 

"Course  I  is."  Dilsey  said. 

The  carriage  jolted  arid  crunched  on  the  drive.  *Tm 
afraid  to  go  and  leave  Quentin."  Mother  said.  "I'd  better 
not  go.  T.  P."  We  went  through  the  gate,  where  it  didnt 
jolt  anymore.  T.  P.  hit  Queenie  with  the  whip. 

"You,  T.  P."  Mother  said. 

"Got  to  get  her  going."  T.  P.  said.  "Keep  her  wake  up 
till  we  get  back  to  the  barn." 

"Turn  around."  Mother  said.  "I'm  afraid  to  go  and  leave 
Quentin." 

"Can't  turn  here."  T.  P.  said.  Then  it  was  broader. 

"Cant  you  turn  here."  Mother  said. 

"All  right."  T.  P.  said.  We  began  to  turn. 

"You,  T.  P."  Mother  said,  clutching  me. 

"I  got  to  turn  around  somehow."  T.  P.  said.  "Whoa, 
Queenie."  We  stopped. 

"You'll  tun)  us  over."  Mother  said. 

"What  you  want  to  do,  then."  T,  P.  said. 


THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FURY  3"^ 

"I'm  afraid  for  you  to  try  to  turn  around."  Mother  said. 

"Get  up,  Queenie."  T.  P.  said,  We  went  on. 

"I  just  know  Dilsey  will  let  something  happen  to  Quen- 
tin  while  I'm  gone."  Mother  said.  "We  must  hurry  back." 

"Hum  up,  there/'  T.  P.  said.  He  hit  Queenie  with  the 
whip. 

"You,  T.  P."  Mother  said,  clutching  me.  I  could  hear 
Queenie's  feet  and  the  bright  shapes  went  smooth  and 
steady  on  both  sides,  the  shadows  of  them  flowing  across 
Queenie's  back.  They  went  on  like  the  bright  tops  of 
wheels.  Then  those  on  one  side  stopped  at  the  tall  white 
post  where  the  soldier  was.  But  on  the  other  side  they 
went  on  smooth  and  steady,  but  a  little  slower. 

'"What  do  you  want."  Jason  said.  He  had  his  hands  in 
his  pockets  and  a  pencil  behind  his  ear. 

"We're  going  to  the  cemetery."  Mother  said, 

"All  right."  Jason  said.  "I  dont  aim  to  stop  you,  do  I, 
Was  that  all  you  wanted  with  me,  just  to  tell  me  that." 

"I  know  you  wont  come."  Mother  said.  "I'd  feel  safer 
if  you  would." 

"Safe  from  what."  Jason  said.  "Father  and  Quentin 
cant  hurt  you." 

Mother  put  her  handkerchief  under  her  veil.  "Stop  it, 
Mother."  Jason  said.  "Do  you  want  to  get  that  damn 
loony  to  bawling  in  the  middle  of  the  square.  Drive  on, 

r.  P." 

"Hum  up,   Queenie."  T,  P,  said. 

"It's  a  judgment  on  me."  Mother  said.  "But  I'll  be  gone 
too,  soon," 

"Here."  Jason  said. 

"Whoa."  T.  P.  said,  Jason  said, 

"Uncle  Maury's  drawing  on  you  for  fifty.  What  do  you 
want  to  do  about  it." 


$2          THE     SOU3STB     AND     THE     FUHY 

"Why  ask  me."  Mother  said.  "I  dont  have  any  say  so.  I 
try  not  to  worry  you  and  Dilsey.  Ill  be  gone  soon,  and 
then  you" 

"Go  on,  T.  P."  Jason  said. 

"Hum  up,  Queenie."  T.  P.  said.  The  shapes  flowed  on« 
The  ones  on  the  other  side  began  again,  bright  and  fast 
and  smooth,  like  when  Caddy  says  we  are  going  to  sleep* 

Cry  baby,  Luster  said.  Aint  you  shamed.  We  went 
through  the  barn.  The  stalls  were  all  open.  Hou  aint  got 
no  spotted  pony  to  ride  now.,  Luster  said.  The  floor  was 
dry  and  dusty.  The  roof  was  falling.  The  slanting  holes 
were  full  of  spinning  yellow.  What  do  you  want  to  go 
that  way  for.  You  want  to  get  your  head  knocked  of 
with  one  of  them  balls, 

"Keep  your  hands  in  your  pockets."  Caddy  said,  "Or 
they'll  be  froze.  You  dont  want  your  hands  froze  on 
Christmas,  do  you." 

We  went  around  the  barn.  The  big  cow  and  the  little 
one  were  standing  in  the  door,  and  we  could  hear  Prince 
and  Queenie  and  Fancy  stomping  inside  the  barn.  "If  it 
wasn't  so  cold,  we'd  ride  Fancy."  Caddy  said,  "But  it's 
too  cold  to  hold  on  today."  Then  we  could  see  the 
branch,  where  the  smoke  was  blowing.  "That's  where 
they  are  killing  the  pig."  Caddy  said.  "We  can  come  back 
by  there  and  see  them."  We  went  down  the  hill. 

"You  want  to  carry  the  letter."  Caddy  said.  <£You  cai* 
carry  it."  She  took  the  letter  out  of  her  pocket  and  put  it 
in  mine,  "it's  a  Christmas  present/'  Caddy  said.  "Uncle 
Maury  is  going  to  surprise  Mrs  Patterson  with  it.  We  got 
to  give  it  to  her  without  letting  anybody  see  it.  Keep 
your  hands  in  your  pockets  good,  now."  We  came  to  the 
branch. 

"If s  froze."  Caddy  said,  "Look."  She  broke  the  top  of 
the  water  and  held  a  piece  of  it  against  my  face.  "Ice* 


THE     SOUND     A2STD     THE     FTTRY          33 

That  means  how  cold  it  is."  She  helped  me  across  and  we 
went  up  the  hill.  "We  cant  even  tell  Mother  and  Father* 
You  know  what  I  think  it  is.  I  think  it's  a  surprise  for 
Mother  and  Father  and  Mr  Patterson  both,  because  Mr 
Patterson  sent  you  some  candy.  Do  you  remember  when 
Mr  Patterson  sent  you  some  candy  last  summer." 

There  was  a  fence.  The  vine  was  dry,  and  the  wind 
rattled  in  it. 

"Only  I  dont  see  why  Uncle  Maury  didn't  send  Versii/* 
Caddy  said.  "Versh  wont  tell."  Mrs  Patterson  was  looking 
out  the  window.  "You  wait  here.''  Caddy  said.  "Wait  righl 
here,  now.  Ill  be  back  in  a  minute.  Give  me  the  letter/ 
She  took  the  letter  out  of  my  pocket.  ""Keep  your  hands 
in  your  pockets."  She  climbed  the  fence  with  the  letter  in 
her  hand  and  went  through  the  brown,  rattling  flowers. 
Mrs  Patterson  came  to  the  door  and  opened  it  and  stood 
there. 

Mr  Patterson  was  chopping  in  the  green  flowers.  He 
stopped  chopping  and  looked  at  me.  Mrs  Patterson  came 
across  the  garden,  running.  When  I  saw  her  eyes  1  began 
to  cry.  Jou  idiot,  Mrs  Patterson  said,  I  told  him  never  to 
send  you  alone  again.  Give  it  to  me.  Quick.  Mr  Patterson 
came  fast,  with  the  hoe.  Mr\s  Patterson  leaned  across  the 
fence.,  reaching  her  hand.  She  was  trying  to  climb  the 
fence.  Give  it  to  me,  she  said,  Give  it  to  me.  Mr  Patterson 
climbed  the  fence.  He  took  the  letter.  Mrs  Pattersons 
dress  was  caught  on  the  fence.  I  saw  her  eyes  again  and 
I  ran  down  the  hill. 

"They  aint  nothing  over  yonder  but  houses."  Lustei 
said.  "We  going  down  to  the  branch." 

They  were  washing  down  at  the  branch.  One  of  them 
was  singing.  I  could  smell  the  clothes  flapping,  and  the 
smoke  blowing  across  the  branch. 


34          THTE     SOTTED     AKD     XBCE 

"You  stay  down  here/'  Luster  said.  "You  aint  got  no 
business  up  yonder.  Them  folks  hit  you,  sho." 

"What  he  want  to  do." 

"He  dont  know  what  he  want  to  do."  Luster  said.  "He 
think  he  want  to  go  up  yonder  where  they  knocking  that 
ball.  You  sit  down  here  and  play  with  your  jimson  weed. 
Look  at  them  chillen  playing  in  the  branch,  if  you  got  to 
look  at  something.  How  come  you  cant  behave  yourself 
like  folks."  I  sat  down  on  the  bank,  where  they  were 
washing,  and  the  smoke  blowing  blue. 

"Is  you  all  seen  anything  of  a  quarter  down  here."  Lus- 
ter said. 

"What  quarter." 

"The  one  I  had  here  this  morning."  Luster  said.  "I  lost 
it  somewhere.  It  fell  through  this  here  hole  in  my  pocket 
If  I  dont  find  it  I  cant  go  to  the  show  tonight." 

"Where'd  you  get  a  quarter,  boy.  Find  it  in  white  folks' 
pocket  while  they  aint  looking." 

"Got  it  at  the  getting  place."  Luster  said.  "Plenty  more 
where  that  one  come  from.  Only  I  got  to  find  that  one. 
Is  you  all  found  it  yet." 

"I  aint  studying  no  quarter.  I  got  my  own  business  to 
tend  to." 

"Come  on  here/'  Luster  said.  "Help  me  look  for  it." 

"He  wouldn't  know  a  quarter  if  he  was  to  see  it,  would 
he." 

"He  can  help  look  Just  the  same."  Luster  said.  "You  all 
going  to  the  show  tonight." 

"Dont  talk  to  me  about  no  show.  Time  I  get  done  over 
this  here  tub  I  be  too  tired  to  lift  my  hand  to  do  noth- 
ing/' 

"I  bet  you  be  there."  Luster  said.  "I  bet  you  was  there 
last  night.  I  bet  you  all  be  right  there  when  that  tent 
open." 


THE     SOUND     AND     THE 

"Be  enough  niggers  there  without  me.  Was  last  night.91 

"Nigger's  money  good  as  white  folks,  I  reckon." 

'White  folks  gives  nigger  money  because  know  first 
white  man  comes  along  with  a  band  going  to  get  it  all 
back,  so  nigger  can  go  to  work  for  some  more/' 

"Aint  nobody  going  make  you  go  to  that  show." 

"Aint  yet.  Aint  thought  of  it,  I  reckon/* 

"What  you  got  against  white  folks/' 

"Aint  got  nothing  against  them.  I  goes  my  way  and  lets 
•white  folks  go  theirs.  I  aint  studying  that  show/' 

"Got  a  man  in  it  can  play  a  tune  on  a  saw.  Play  it  like 
a  banjo/' 

"You  go  last  night"  Luster  said.  "I  going  tonight.  If  I 
can  find  where  I  lost  that  quarter/' 

"You  going  take  him  with  you,  I  reckon/' 

"Me."  Luster  said.  "You  reckon  I  be  found  anywhere 
with  him,  time  he  start  bellering." 

"What  does  you  do  when  he  start  bellering/* 

1  whips  him."  Luster  said.  He  sat  down  and  rolled  up 
his  overalls.  They  played  in  the  branch. 

"You  all  found  any  balls  yet."  Luster  said. 

"Aint  you  talking  biggity.  I  bet  you  better  not  let  your 
grandmammy  hear  you  talking  like  that/7 

Luster  got  into  the  branch,  where  they  were  playing. 
He  hunted  in  the  water,  along  the  bank. 

"I  had  it  when  we  was  down  here  this  morning/'  Lus- 
ter said. 

"Where  'bouts  you  lose  it*" 

"Right  out  this  here  hole  in  rny  pocket/'  Luster  said. 
They  hunted  in  the  branch.  Then  they  all  stood  up  quick 
and  stopped,  then  they  splashed  and  fought  in  the 
branch.  Luster  got  it  and  they  squatted  in  the  water, 
looking  up  the  hill  through  the  bushes. 

'Where  is  they."  Luster  said 


Jo          THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FtJBY 

"Aint  in  sight  yet/' 

Luster  put  it  in  his  pocket.  They  came  down  the  hill* 

"Did  a  ball  come  down  here/7 

"It  ought  to  be  in  the  water.  Didn't  any  of  you  boys  see 
it  or  hear  it/* 

"Aint  heard  nothing  come  down  here."  Luster  said. 
*Heard  something  hit  that  tree  up  yonder.  Dont  know 
which  way  it  went/' 

They  looked  in  the  branch. 

"Hell.  Look  along  the  branch.  It  came  down  here.  I 
saw  it/5 

They  looked  along  the  branch.  Then  they  went  back 
up  the  hill. 

"Have  you  got  that  ball/*  the  boy  said. 

"What  I  want  with  it/'  Luster  said.  "I  aint  seen  no  ball/* 

The  boy  got  in  the  water.  He  went  on.  He  turned  and 
looked  at  Luster  again.  He  went  on  down  the  branch. 

The  man  said  "Caddie"  up  the  hill.  The  boy  got  out  of 
the  water  and  went  up  the  hill. 

"Now,  just  listen  at  you/*  Luster  said.  "Hush  up/* 

"What  he  moaning  about  now/' 

"Lawd  knows."  Luster  said.  "He  just  starts  like  that.' 
He  been  at  it  aU  morning.  Cause  it  his  birthday,  I  reckon.** 

"How  old  he/' 

"He  thirty-three/'  Luster  said.  'Thirty-three  this  morn- 
ing/' 

"You  mean,  he  been  three  years  old  thirty  years/* 

"I  going  by  what  mammy  say/'  Luster  said.  "I  dont 
know.  We  going  to  have  thirty-three  candles  on  a  cake, 
anyway.  Little  cake.  Wont  hardly  hold  them.  Hush  up. 
Come  on  back  here/*  He  came  and  caught  my  arm.  "You 
old  loony/'  he  said.  "You  want  me  to  whip  you/' 

"I  bet  you  will." 

"I  is  done  it.  Hush,  now/'  Luster  said.  "Aint  I  told  you 


TH1E     SOUND     X^TB     TELE     FXJK1T          37 

you  cant  go  up  there.  They'll  knock  your  head  clean  ofl 
with  one  of  them  balls.  Come  on,  here.""  He  palled  me 
back.  "Sit  down."  I  sat  down  and  he  took  off  my  shoes 
and  rolled  up  my  trousers.  "Now,  git  in  that  water  and 
play  and  see  can  you  stop  that  slobbering  and  moaning/1 

I  hushed  and  got  in  the  water  and  Roskus  came  and 
said  to  come  to  supper  and  Caddy  said, 

It's  not  supper  time  yet.  I'm  not  going. 

She  was  wet.  We  were  playing  in  the  branch  and 
Caddy  squatted  down  and  got  her  dress  wet  and  Versh 
said, 

"Your  mommer  going  to  whip  you  for  getting  youi 
dress  wet" 

"She's  not  going  to  do  any  such  thing/'  Caddy  said. 

"How  do  you  know/'  Quentin  said. 

"That's  all  right  how  I  know/'  Caddy  said.  "How  do 
you  know/' 

"She  said  she  was."  Quentin  said.  "Besides,  I'm  older 
than  you/* 

"I'm  seven  years  old."  Caddy  said,  "I  guess  I  know/' 

"I'm  older  than  that/'  Quentin  said.  "I  go  to  school. 
Dont  I,  Versh/' 

"I'm  going  to  school  next  year/'  Caddy  said,  "When  it 
comes.  Aint  I,  Versh." 

"You  know  she  whip  you  when  you  get  your  dress 
wet"  Versh  said. 

"It's  not  wet."  Caddy  said.  She  stood  up  in  the  water 
and  looked  at  her  dress.  Til  take  it  off."  she  said,  "Then 
it'll  dry/' 

"I  bet  you  wont."  Quentin  said. 

"I  bet  I  will/'  Caddy  said. 

"I  bet  you  better  not,"  Quentin  said. 

Caddy  came  to  Versh  and  me  and  turned  her  bacle. 

"Unbutton  it,  Versh."  she  said. 


3$          THE     SOtTNB     AKB     THE     FUSY 

TDont  you  do  it,  Versh."  Quentin  said* 

'Taint  none  of  my  dress."  Versh  said. 

"You  unbutton  it,  Versh/'  Caddy  said,  "Or  Til  tel  Dil- 
sey  what  you  did  yesterday/*  So  Versh  unbuttoned  it. 

"You  just  take  your  dress  off/5  Quentin  said.  Caddy 
took  her  dress  off  and  threw  it  on  the  bank.  Then  she 
didn't  have  on  anything  but  her  bodice  and  drawers,  and 
Queiitin  slapped  her  and  she  slipped  and  fell  down  in 
lie  water.  When  she  got  up  she  began  to  splash  water  on 
Quentin,  and  Quentin  splashed  water  on  Caddy.  Some  of 
it  splashed  on  Versh  and  me  and  Versh  picked  me  up 
and  put  me  on  the  bank.  He  said  he  was  going  to  tell  on 
Caddy  and  Quentin,  and  then  Quentin  and  Caddy  began 
to  splash  water  at  Versh.  He  got  behind  a  bush. 

Tm  going  to  tell  mammy  on  you  all/*  Versh  said. 

Quentin  climbed  up  on  the  bank  and  tried  to  catch 
Versh,  but  Versh  ran  away  and  Quentin  couldn't.  When 
Quentin  came  back  Versh  stopped  and  hollered  that  he 
was  going  to  tell.  Caddy  told  him  that  if  he  wouldn't  tell, 
they'd  let  him  come  back.  So  Versh  said  he  wouldn't,  and 
they  let  him. 

*£Now  I  guess  you're  satisfied/*  Quentin  said,  <cWeTl 
both  get  whipped  now/* 

*I  dont  care/*  Caddy  said.  Til  run  away/' 

"Yes  you  will."  Quentin  said. 

Til  run  away  and  never  come  back/*  Caddy  said.  I  be- 
gan to  cry.  Caddy  turned  around  and  said  "Hush."  So  I 
hushed.  Then  they  played  in  the  branch.  Jason  was  play- 
ing too.  He  was  by  himself  further  down  the  branch. 
Versh  came  around  the  bush  and  lifted  me  down  into  the 
watei  again.  Caddy  was  all  wet  and  muddy  behind,  and 
I  started  to  cry  and  she  came  and  squatted  in  the  water. 

"Hush  now/'  she  said.  "I'm  not  going  to  run  away/*  So 
I  hushed.  Caddv  smelled  like  trees  in  the  rain- 


TIT®     tiUXTWB     ASTD     THE     FIT&Y          39 

is  £/ie  matter  with  you,  Luster  said.  Cant  you  gei 
done  with  that  moaning  and  play  in  the  branch  like  folks. 

Whynt  you  take  him  on  home.  Didn't  they  told  you 
not  to  take  him  off  the  place. 

He  still  think  they  own  this  pasture,  Luster  said.  Cant 
nobody  see  down  here  from  the  house,  noways. 

We  can.  And  folks  dont  like  to  look  at  a  loony.  Taint 
no  luck  in  it. 

Roskus  came  and  said  to  come  to  supper  and  Caddy 
said  it  wasn't  supper  time  yet. 

"Yes  tis."  Roskus  said.  "Dilsey  say  for  you  all  to  come 
on  to  the  house.  Bring  them  on,  Versh."  He  went  up  the 
hill,  where  the  cow  was  lowing. 

"Maybe  we'll  bs  dry  by  the  time  we  get  to  the  house.* 
Quentin  said. 

"It  was  all  your  fault/'  Caddy  said.  "I  hope  we  do  get 
whipped/'  She  put  her  dress  on  and  Versh  buttoned  it. 

"They  wont  know  you  got  wet"  Versh  said.  "It  doni 
show  on  you.  Less  me  and  Jason  tells/* 

"Are  you  going  to  tell,  Jason/'  Caddy  said. 

"Tell  on  who."  Jason  said. 

"He  wont  tell."  Quentin  said.  "Will  you,  Jason/' 

"I  bet  he  does  tell."  Caddy  said.  "He'll  tell  Damuddy  * 

"He  cant  tell  her."  Quentin  said.  "She's  sick.  If  we  walk 
slow  it'll  be  too  dark  for  them  to  see." 

"I  dont  care  whether  they  see  or  not"  Caddy  said.  Tm 
going  to  tell,  myself.  You.  carry  him  up  the  hill,  Versh." 

"Jason  wont  tell."  Quentin  said.  "You  remember  that 
bow  and  arrow  I  made  you,  Jason." 

"It's  broke  now."  Jason  said. 

"Let  him  tell."  Caddy  said.  "I  dont  give  a  cuss.  Carry 
Maury  up  the  hill,  Versh."  Versh  squatted  and  I  got  on 
his  back. 


4°   ~THE  SOUND  AND  THE  FUKY 

See  you  all  at  the  show  tonight,  Luster  said.  Come  on? 
here.  We  got  to  find  that  quarter. 

"If  we  go  slow,  it'll  be  dark  when  we  get  there.'1 
Quentin  said. 

"I'm  not  going  slow."  Caddy  said.  We  went  up  the  hill, 
but  Quentm  didn't  come.  He  was  down  at  the  branch 
when  we  got  to  where  we  could  smell  the  pigs.  They 
were  grunting  and  snuffing  in  the  trough  in  the  corner. 
Jason  came  behind  us,  with  his  hands  in  his  pockets.  Bos- 
kets was  milkmg  the  cow  in  the  barn  door, 

The  cows  came  jumping  out  of  the  barn. 

"Go  on."  Tv  P.  said.  "Holler  again.  I  going  to  holler  my- 
self, Whooey/'  Quentin  kicked  T.  P.  again.  He  kicked 
T*  P.  into  thtf  trough  where  the  pigs  ate  and  T.  P.  lay 
there.  "Hot  dog/'  T.  P.  said,  "Didn't  he  get  rne  then.  You 
see  that  white  man  kick  me  that  time.  Whooey/' 

I  wasn't  crying,  but  I  couldn't  stop.  I  wasn't  crying,  but 
the  ground  wasn't  still,  and  then  I  was  crying.  The 
groind  kept  sloping  up  and  the  cows  ran  up  the  hill. 
T.  P.  tried  to  get  up.  He  fell  down  again  and  the  cows  ran 
down  the  hill.  Quentin  held  my  arm  and  we  went  toward 
the  barn.  Then  the  barn  wasn't  there  and  we  had  to  wait 
until  it  came  back.  I  didn't  see  it  come  back,  It  came  be- 
Iiind  us  and  Quentin  set  me  down  in  the  trough  where 
the  cows  ate.  I  held  on  to  it.  It  was  going  away  too,  c&d 
I  held  to  it.  The  cows  ran  down  the  hill  again,  across  the 
door.  I  couldn't  stop.  Quentin  and  T.  P  came  up  the  hill, 
fighting.  T.  P.  was  falling  down  the  hill  and  Quentin 
dragged  him  up  the  hill.  Quentin  hit  T.  P.  I  couldn't  stop* 

"Stand  up."  Quentin  said,  "You  stay  right  here.  Dont 
you  go  away  until  I  get  back/* 

"Me  and  Benjy  going  back  to  the  wedding."  T.  P,  said. 
'Whooey/' 

Ouentin  hit  T.  P.  again.  Then  he  began  to  thump  T.  P. 


THE      SOUND     AKD      THE      FtTXY  4* 

against  the  wall.  T.  P.  was  laughing.  Every  time  Quentin 
thumped  him  against  the  wall  he  tried  to  say  Whooey, 
but  he  couldn't  say  it  for  laughing.  I  quit  crying,  but  I 
couldn't  stop.  T.  P.  fell  on  me  and  the  bam  door  went 
away.  It  went  down  the  hill  and  T.  P.  was  fighting  by 
himself  and  he  fell  down  again.  He  was  still  laughing, 
and  I  couldn't  stop,  and  I  tried  to  get  up  and  I  fell  down, 
and  I  couldn't  stop.  Versh  said, 

"You  sho  done  it  now.  Ill  declare  if  you  aint.  Shut  up 
that  yelling." 

T.  P.  was  still  laughing.  He  flopped  on  the  door  and 
laughed.  "Whooey."  he  said,  "Me  and  Benjy  going  back 
to  the  wedding.  Sassprilluh."  T.  P.  said. 

"Hush."  Versh  said.  "Where  you  get  it." 

"Out  the  cellar."  T.  P.  said.  "Whooey:' 

"Hush  up."  Versh  said,  "Where'bouts  in  the  cellar." 

"Anywhere."  T.  P.  said.  He  laughed  some  more.  "Moren 
a  hundred  bottles  left.  Moren  a  million.  Look  out,  nigger, 
I  going  to  holler." 

Quentin  said,  "Lift  him  up." 

Versh  lifted  me  up, 

"Drink  this,  Benjy."  Quentin  said.  The  glass  was  hot 
"Hush,  now."  Quentin  said.  "Drink  it." 

"Sassprilluh."  T.  P.  said.  "Lemme  drink  it,  Mr  Quentin." 

"You  shut  your  mouth."  Versh  said,  "Mr  Quentin  weal 
you  out." 

"Hold  him,  Versh."  Quentin  said. 

They  held  me.  It  was  hot  on  my  chin  and  on  my  shirt. 
"Drink."  Quentin  said.  They  held  my  head.  It  was  hot  in- 
side me,  and  I  began  again.  It  was  crying  now,  and  some' 
thing  was  happening  inside  me  and  I  cried  more,  and 
they  held  me  until  it  stopped  happening.  Then  I  hushed, 
It  was  still  going  around,  and  then  the  shapes  began. 
"Open  the  crib,  Versh,"  They  were  going  slow.  "Spread 


4*  THE     SOUND     AKB     THE 

those  empty  sacks  on  the  floor/'  They  were  going  faster, 
almost  fast  enough.  "Now.  Pick  up  his  feet."  They  went 
on,  smooth  and  bright.  I  could  hear  T.  P.  laughing.  I 
went  on  with  them,  up  the  bright  hill. 

At  the  top  of  the  hill  Versh  put  me  down.  "Come  on 
here,  Quentin/'  he  called,  looking  back  down  the  hill. 
Quentin  was  still  standing  there  by  the  branch.  He  was 
chunking  into  the  shadows  where  the  branch  was, 

"Let  the  old  skizzard  stay  there."  Caddy  said.  She  took 
my  hand  and  we  went  on  past  the  barn  and  through  the 
gate.  There  was  a  frog  on  the  brick  walk,  squatting  in 
the  middle  of  it.  Caddy  stepped  over  it  and  pulled  me 
on. 

"Come  on,  Maury."  she  said.  It  still  squatted  there  until 
Jason  poked  at  it  with  his  toe. 

"He'll  make  a  wart  on  you."  Versh  said.  The  frog 
hopped  away. 

"Come   on,   Maury."   Caddy   said. 

"They  got  company  tonight."  Versh  said. 

"How  do  you  know."  Caddy  said. 

'With  all  them  lights  on."  Versh  said,  "Light  in  every 
Window." 

"I  reckon  we  can  turn  all  the  lights  on  without  com- 
pany, if  we  want  to."  Caddy  said. 

"I  bet  it's  company."  Versh  said.  "You  all  better  go  in 
the  back  and  slip  upstairs." 

"I  dont  care."  Caddy  said.  "I'll  walk  right  in  the  parlor 
where  they  are/' 

"I  bet  your  pappy  whip  you  if  you  do."  Versh  said. 

"I  dont  care."  Caddy  said,  "111  walk  right  in  the  parlor. 
Ill  walk  right  in  the  dining  room  and  eat  supper." 

'Where  you  sit."  Versh  said. 

"I'd  sit  in  Damuddy's  chair."  Caddy  said.  "She  eats  in 
bed." 


THE     SOU3STD     A1STB     THE     FTJ&Y  43 

*Tm  hungry."  Jason  said.  He  passed  us  and  ran  on  up 
the  walk.  He  had  his  hands  in  his  pockets  and  he  fell 
down.  Versh  went  and  picked  him  up. 

"If  you  keep  them  hands  out  your  pockets,  you  could 
stay  on  your  feet."  Versh  said.  "You  cant  never  get  them 
out  in  time  to  catch  yourself,  fat  as  you  is." 

Father  was  standing  by  the  kitchen  steps. 

"Where's  Quentin."  he  said. 

"He  coming  up  the  walk."  Versh  said.  Quentin  was 
coming  slow.  His  shirt  was  a  white  blur. 

"Oh"  Father  said.  Light  fell  down  the  steps,  on  him. 

"Caddy  and  Quentin  threw  water  on  each  other."  Ja- 
son said. 

We  waited. 

"They  did."  Father  said.  Quentin  came,  and  Father 
said,  "You  can  eat  supper  in  the  kitchen  tonight."  He 
stopped  and  took  me  up,  and  the  light  came  tumbling 
down  the  steps  on  me  too,  and  I  could  look  down  at 
Caddy  and  Jason  and  Quentin  and  Versh.  Father  turned 
toward  the  steps.  "You  must  be  quiet,  though/'  he  said. 

"Why  must  we  be  quiet,  Father."  Caddy  said.  "Have 
we  got  company." 

"Yes."   Father  said. 

"I  told  you  they  was  company."  Versh  said. 

"You  did  not."  Caddy  said,  "I  was  the  one  that  said 
there  was.  I  said  I  would" 

"Hush."  Father  said.  They  hushed  and  Father  opened 
the  door  and  we  crossed  the  back  porch  and  went  in  to 
the  kitchen.  Dilsey  was  there,  and  Father  put  me  in  the 
chair  and  closed  the  apron  down  and  pushed  it  to  the 
table,  where  supper  was.  It  was  steaming  up. 

"You  mind  Dilsey,  now."  Father  said.  "Dont  let  them 
make  any  more  noise  than  they  can  help,  Dilsey." 

"Yes,  sir."  Dilsey  said.  Father  went  away. 


44  THE     SOUSTD     ATSTB     THE     FURT 

"Remember  to  mind  Dilsey,  now."  he  said  behind  us. 
I  leaned  my  face  over  where  the  supper  was.  It  steamed 
up  on  my  face. 

"Let  them  mind  me  tonight,  Father,"  Caddy  said 

"I  wont."  Jason  said.  "I'm  going  to  mind  Dilsey." 

"You'll  have  to,  if  Father  says  so."  Caddy  said.  "Let 
them  mind  me,  Father." 

"I  wont"  Jason  said,  "I  wont  mind  you." 

"Hush."  Father  said.  'You  all  mind  Caddy,  then.  When 
they  are  done,  bring  them  up  the  back  stairs,  Dilsey." 

"Yes,  sir."  Dilsey  said. 

"There."  Caddy  said,  "Now  I  guess  youll  mind  me." 

"You  all  hush,  now."  Dilsey  said.  "You  got  to  be  quiet 
tonight." 

"Why  do  we  have  to  be  quiet  tonight."  Caddy  whis- 
pered. 

"Never  you  mind."  Dilsey  said.  "Youll  know  in  the 
JLawd's  own  time."  She  brought  my  bowl.  The  steam 
from  it  came  and  tickled  my  face.  "Come  here,  Versh." 
Dilsey  said. 

"When  is  the  Lawd's  own  time,  Dilsey."  Caddy  said. 

"It's  Sunday."  Quentin  said.  "Dont  you  know  anything." 

"Shhhhhh."  Dilsey  said.  "Didn't  Mr  Jason  say  for  you 
all  to  be  quiet.  Eat  your  supper,  now.  Here,  Versh.  Git 
his  spoon."  Versh's  hand  came  with  the  spoon,  into  the 
bowl.  The  spoon  came  up  to  my  mouth.  The  steam  tick- 
led into  my  mouth.  Then  we  quit  eating  and  we  looked 
at  each  other  and  we  were  quiet,  and  then  we  heard  it 
again  and  I  began  to  cry. 

"What  was  that."  Caddy  said.  She  put  her  hand  on 
my  hand, 

"That  was  Mother."  Quentin  said.  The  spoon  came  up 
and  I  ate,  then  I  cried  again. 

"Hush."  Caddy  said.  But  I  didn't  hush  and  she  came 


THE    source    AND    THE    ruBY       45 

and  put  her  arms  around  me.  Dilsey  went  and  closed 
both  the  doors  and  then  we  couldn't  hear  it. 

"Hush,  now."  Caddy  said.  I  hushed  and  ate.  Quentin 
wasn't  eating,  but  Jason  was. 

'That  was  Mother."  Quentin  said.  He  got  up. 

"You  set  right  down."  Dilsey  said.  "They  got  company 
in  there,  and  you  in  them  muddy  clothes.  You  set  down 
too,  Caddy,  and  get  done  eating." 

"She  was  crying."  Quentin  said. 

"It  was  somebody  singing."  Caddy  said.  "Wasn't  it, 
Dilsey," 

'You  all  eat  your  supper,  now,  like  Mr  Jason  said."  Dil- 
sey said.  'You'll  know  in  the  Lawd's  own  time."  Caddy 
went  back  to  her  chair. 

"I  told  you  it  was  a  party."  she  said. 

Versh  said,  "He  done  et  all  that." 

"Bring  his  bowl  here."  Dilsey  said.  The  bowl  went 
away. 

"Dilsey."  Caddy  said,  "Quentin's  not  eating  his  supper* 
Hasn't  he  got  to  mind  me." 

"Eat  your  supper,  Quentin."  Dilsey  said,  'You  all  got 
to  get  done  and  get  out  of  my  kitchen." 

"I  dont  want  any  more  supper."  Quentin  said. 

"You've  got  to  eat  i£  I  say  you  have."  Caddy  said* 
"Hasn't  he,  Dilsey." 

The  bowl  steamed  up  to  my  face,  and  Versh's  hand 
dipped  the  spoon  in  it  and  the  steam  tickled  into  my 
mouth. 

"I  dont  want  any  more."  Quentin  said.  "How  can  they 
have  a  party  when  Damuddy's  sick." 

"They'll  have  it  down  stairs."  Caddy  said.  "She  can 
come  to  the  landing  and  see  it.  That's  what  I'm  going  to 
do  when  I  get  my  nightie  on." 


\6     THE  SOUND  AND  THE  FURY 

"Mother  was  crying/*  Quentin  said.  'Wasn't  she  crying, 
Dilsey." 

"Dont  you  come  pestering  at  me,  boy."  Dilsey  said.  *1 
got  to  get  supper  for  all  them  folks  soon  as  you  all  get 
done  eating." 

After  a  while  even  Jason  was  through  eating,  and  lie 
began  to  cry. 

"Now  you  got  to  tune  up."  Dilsey  said. 

"He  does  it  every  night  since  Damuddy  was  sick  and 
%e  cant  sleep  with  her."  Caddy  said.  "Cry  baby." 

"I'm  going  to  tell  on  you."  Jason  said. 

He  was  crying.  "You've  already  told."  Caddy  said, 
^There's  not  anything  else  you  can  tell,  now." 

"You  all  needs  to  go  to  bed."  Dilsey  said.  She  came  and 
lifted  me  down  and  wiped  my  face  and  hands  with  a 
warm  cloth.  "Versh,  can  you  get  them  up  the  back  stairs 
quiet  You,  Jason,  shut  up  that  crying." 

"It's  too  early  to  go  to  bed  now."  Caddy  said.  **We 
dont  ever  have  to  go  to  bed  this  early." 

"You  is  tonight."  Dilsey  said.  "Your  pa  say  for  you  to 
come  right  on  up  stairs  when  you  et  supper.  You  heard 
him." 

"He  said  to  mind  me."  Caddy  said. 

€Tm  not  going  to  mind  you."  Jason  said. 

"You  have  to."  Caddy  said.  "Come  on,  now.  You  have 
to  do  like  I  say." 

"Make  them  be  quiet,  Versh."  Dilsey  said.  "You  all  go- 
Ing  to  be  quiet,  ain't  you." 

"What  do  we  have  to  be  so  quiet  for,  tonight."  Caddy 
said. 

"Your  mommer  aint  feeling  well."  Dilsey  said.  "You  all 
go  on  with  Versh,  now." 

*1  told  you  Mother  was  crying."  Quentin  said.  Versh 


THE  SOUND  AND  THE  FUBY    47 

took  me  up  and  opened  the  door  onto  the  back  porch, 
We  went  out  and  Versh  closed  the  door  back.  I  couM 
smell  Versh  and  feel  him.  "You  all  be  quiet,  now.  We're 
not  going  up  stairs  yet.  Mr.  Jason  said  for  you  to  come 
right  up  stairs.  He  said  to  mind  me.  I'm  not  going  to 
mind  you.  But  he  said  for  all  of  us  to.  Didn't  he,  Quen- 
tin."  I  could  feel  Versh's  head.  I  could  hear  us.  TDidn'i 
he,  Versh.  Yes,  that's  right.  Then  I  say  for  us  to  go  out 
doors  a  while.  Come  on/'  Versh  opened  the  door  and  we 
went  out. 

We  went  down  the  steps. 

"I  expect  we'd  better  go  down  to  Versh's  house,  so  well 
be  quiet/*  Caddy  said.  Versh  put  me  down  and  Caddy 
took  my  hand  and  we  went  down  the  brick  walk. 

"Come  on."  Caddy  said,  'That  frog's  gone.  He's 
hopped  way  over  to  the  garden,  by  now.  Maybe  we'll  see 
another  one."  Roskus  came  with  the  milk  buckets.  He 
went  on.  Quentin  wasn't  coming  with  us.  He  was  sitting 
on  the  kitchen  steps.  We  went  down  to  Versh's  house.  I 
liked  to  smell  Versh's  house.  There  was  a  fire  in  it  and 
T.  P.  squatting  in  his  shirt  tail  in  front  of  it,  chunking  U 
into  a  blaze. 

Then  I  got  up  and  T.  P.  dressed  me  and  we  went  to 
the  kitchen  and  ate.  Dilsey  was  singing  and  I  began  to 
cry  and  she  stopped. 

"Keep  him  away  from  the  house,  now/'  Dilsey  said. 

"We  cant  go  that  way/'  T.  P.  said. 

We  played  in  the  branch. 

"We  cant  go  around  yonder/'  T.  P.  said.  "Dont  you 
know  mammy  say  we  cant/' 

Dilsey  was  singing  in  the  kitchen  and  I  began  to  cry, 

"Hush."  T.  P.  said.  "Come  on.  Lets  go  down  to  the 
barn/9 


48  THE     SOUNB     AND     THE     :FTJRY 

Roskus  was  milking  at  the  bam.  He  was  milking  with 
one  hand,  and  groaning.  Some  birds  sat  on  the  barn  door 
and  watched  him.  One  of  them  came  down  and  ate  with 
the  cows.  I  watched  Roskus  milk  while  T.  P,  was  feeding 
Queenie  and  Prince.  The  calf  was  in  the  pig  pen.  It  nuz- 
zled at  the  wire,  bawling. 

T.  P."  Roskus  said.  T.  P.  said  Sir,  in  the  barn.  Fancy 
held  her  head  over  the  door,  because  T.  P.  hadn't  fed  her 
yet.  "Git  done  there/7  Roskus  said.  "You  got  to  do  this 
milking.  I  cant  use  my  right  hand  no  more." 

T.  P.  came  and  milked. 

"Whyn't  you  get  the  doctor."  T,  P.  said, 

"Doctor  cant  do  no  good/'  Roskus  said<  "Not  on  this 
place/' 

"What  wrong  with  this  place/'  T.  P.  said. 

"Taint  no  luck  on  this  place/'  Roskus  said.  "Turn  that 
calf  in  if  you  done." 

Taint  no  hick  on  this  place,  Roskus  said.  The  "fire  rose 
and  fell  behind  him  and  Versh,  sliding  on  his  and  VersKs 
face.  Dilsey  finished  putting  me  to  bed.  The  bed  smelled 
like  T.  P.  I  liked  it. 

"What  you  know  about  it."  Dilsey  said.  "What  trance 
you  been  in." 

"Dont  need  no  trance/'  Roskus  said.  "Aint  the  sign  of  it 
laying  right  there  on  that  bed.  Aint  the  sign  of  it  been 
here  for  folks  to  see  fifteen  years  now/* 

"Spose  it  is."  Dilsey  said.  "It  aint  hurt  none  of  you  and 
youra,  is  it.  Versh  working  and  Frony  married  off  your 
hands  and  T.  P.  getting  big  enough  to  take  your  place 
when  rheumatism  finish  getting  you." 

They  been  two,  now."  Roskus  said.  "Going  to  be  one 
more.  I  seen  the  sign,  and  you  is  too." 

"I  heard  a  squinch  owl  that  night."  T.  P.  said.  "Dan 
wouldn't  corne  and  get  his  supper,  neither.  Wouldn't 


THE     SOUND     A3STB     THE     FURY          49 

tjome  no  closer  than  the  barn.  Begun  howling  right  after 
dark.  Versh  heard  him." 

"Going  to  be  more  than  one  more."  Dilsey  said.  "Show 
me  the  man  what  aint  going  to  die,  bless  Jesus." 

"Dying  aint  all/*  Roskus  said. 

"I  knows  what  you  thinking/'  Dilsey  said.  "And  they 
aint  going  to  be  no  luck  in  saying  that  name,  lessen  you 
going  to  set  up  with  him  while  he  cries." 

"They  aint  no  luck  on  this  place/'  Roskus  said*  "I  seen 
it  at  first  but  when  they  changed  his  name  I  knowed  it." 

"Hush  your  mouth/'  Dilsey  said.  She  pulled  the  covers 
up.  It  smelled  like  T.  P.  "You  all  shut  up  now,  till  he  get 
to  sleep/' 

"I  seen  the  sign/*  Roskus  said. 

"Sign  T.  P.  got  to  do  all  your  work  for  you."  Dilsey 
said.  Take  him  and  Quentin  down  to  the  house  and  lei 
them  play  with  Luster,  where  Frony  can  watch  them^ 
T.  P.,  and  go  and  help  your  pa. 

We  finished  eating.  T.  P.  took  Quentin  up  and  we  went 
down  to  T.  P/s  house.  Luster  was  playing  in  the  dirt, 
T.  P.  put  Quentin  down  and  she  played  in  the  dirt  too. 
Luster  had  some  spools  and  he  and  Quentin  fought  and 
Quentin  had  the  spools.  Luster  cried  and  Frony  came 
and  gave  Luster  a  tin  can  to  play  with,  and  then  I  had 
the  spools  and  Quentin  fought  me  and  I  cried. 

"Hush."  Frony  said,  "Aint  you  shamed  of  yourself.  Tak- 
ing a  baby's  play  pretty/'  She  took  the  spools  from  me 
and  gave  them  back  to  Quentin. 

"Hush,  now/'  Frony  said,  "Hush,  I  tell  you/' 

"Hush  up/'  Frony  said.  "You  needs  whipping,  that's 
what  you  needs/'  She  took  Luster  and  Quentin  up. 
"Come  on  here."  she  said.  We  went  to  the  barn.  T.  P.  was 
milking  the  cow.  Roskus  was  sitting  on  the  box. 

"What's  the  matter  with  him  now."  Roskus  said. 


JO          THE     SOIJ^D     AND     THE     FURY 

"You  have  to  keep  him  down  here."  Frony  said.  "He 
fighting  these  babies  again.  Taking  they  play  things.  Stay 
here  with  T.  P.  now,  and  see  can  you  hush  a  while/' 

"Clean  that  udder  good  now."  Roskus  said.  "You  milked 
that  young  cow  dry  last  winter.  If  you  milk  this  one  dry, 
they  aint  going  to  be  no  more  milk/* 

Dilsey  was   singing. 

"Not  around  yonder."  T.  P.  said.  "Dont  you  know 
mammy  say  you  cant  go  around  there/* 

They  were  singing. 

"Come  on."  T.  P.  said.  "Lets  go  play  with  Quentin  and 
Luster.  Come  on." 

Quentin  and  Luster  were  playing  in  the  dirt  in  front  of 
T.  P/s  house.  There  was  a  fire  in  the  house,  rising  and 
falling,  with  Roskus  sitting  black  against  it. 

"That's  three,  thank  the  Lawd."  Roskus  said  "I  told 
you  two  years  ago.  They  aint  no  luck  on  this  place." 

"Whyn't  you  get  out,  then."  Dilsey  said.  She  was  un- 
dressing me.  ""Your  bad  luck  talk  got  them  Memphis  no- 
tions into  Versh.  That  ought  to  satisfy  you/' 

"If  that  all  the  bad  luck  Versh  have."  Roskus  said. 

Frony  came  in. 

"You  all  done/*  Dilsey  said. 

"T.  P.  finishing  up."  Frony  said.  "Miss  Cahline  want 
you  to  put  Quentin  to  bed." 

"I'm  coming  just  as  fast  as  I  can."  Dilsey  said.  "She 
ought  to  know  by  this  time  I  aint  got  no  wings." 

"That's  what  I  tell  you."  Roskus  said.  "They  aint  no 
hick  going  be  on  no  place  Where  one  of  they  own  chillens* 
name  aint  never  spoke." 

"Hush."  Dilsey  said.  "Do  you  want  to  get  him  started" 

"Raising  a  child  not  to  know  its  own  mammy's  name." 
fioskus  said. 

"Dont  you  bother  your  head  about  her."  Dilsey  said. 


SOUSTD  "  AND     THE     FTJBY  5* 

*1  raised  all  of  them  and  I  reckon  I  can  raise  one  more. 
Hush  now.  Let  him  get  to  sleep  if  he  will/' 

"Saying  a  name."  Frony  said.  "He  dont  know  nobody*s 
name/' 

""You  just  say  it  and  see  if  he  dont."  Dilsey  said.  "You 
say  it  to  him  while  he  sleeping  and  I  bet  he  hear  you/* 

"He  know  lot  more  than  folks  thinks."  Roskus  said.  "He 
knowed  they  time  was  coming,  like  that  pointer  done. 
He  could  tell  you  when  hisn  coming,  if  he  could  talk.  Oi 
yours.  Or  mine." 

"You  take  Luster  outen  that  bed,  mammy ."  Frony  said. 
"That  boy  conjure  him." 

"Hush  your  mouth."  Dilsey  said,  "Aint  you  got  no  bet- 
ter sense  than  that.  What  you  want  to  listen  to  Roskus 
for,  anyway.  Get  in,  Benjy." 

Dilsey  pushed  me  and  I  got  in  the  bed,  where  Lustet 
already  was.  He  was  alseep.  Dilsey  took  a  long  piece  of 
wood  and  laid  it  between  Luster  and  me.  "Stay  on  your 
side  now."  Dilsey  said.  "Luster  little,  and  you  don't  want 
to  hurt  him/* 

You  cant  go  yet,  T.  P.  said.  Wait. 

We  looked  around  the  corner  of  the  house  and 
watched  the  carriages  go  away. 

"Now/'  T.  P.  said.  He  took  Quentin  up  and  we  ran 
down  to  the  corner  of  the  fence  and  watched  them  pass. 
"There  he  go/'  T.  P.  said.  "See  that  one  with  the  glass  in 
it.  Look  at  him.  He  laying  in  there.  See  him." 

Come  on,  Luster  said,  I  going  to  take  this  here  ball 
down  home,  where  I  wont  lose  it.  Naw,  siry  you  cant 
have  it.  If  them  men  sees  you  with  it,  they'll  say  you  stole 
it.  Hush  up,  now.  You  cant  have  it.  What  business  you  got 
with  it.  You  cant  play  no  ball. 

Frony  and  T.  P.  were  playing  in  the  dirt  by  the  door, 
T.  R  had  lightning  bugs  in  a  bottle. 


f2          THE     SOTJ-KB     AND     THE     FURY 

"How  did  you  all  get  back  out/7  Frony  said. 

"We've  got  company."  Caddy  said.  "Father  said  for  us 
to  mind  me  tonight.  I  expect  you  and  T.  P.  will  have  to 
mind  me  too." 

"I'm  not  going  to  mind  you/*  Jason  said.  "Frony  and 
T.  P.  dont  have  to  either/' 

'They  will  if  I  say  so/'  Caddy  said.  "Maybe  I  wont  say 
for  them  to/* 

"T.  P.  dont  mind  nobody/'  Frony  said.  "Is  they  started 
the  funeral  yet/' 

"What's  a  funeral."  Jason  said. 

"Didn't  mammy  tell  you  not  to  tell  them/"  Versh  said. 

'Where  they  moans/'  Frony  said.  'They  moaned  twc 
•lays  on  Sis  Beulah  Clay/' 

They  moaned  at  Dilsey  s  house.  Dilsey  was  moaning. 
When  Dilsey  moaned  Luster  saidy  Hush,  and  we  hushed^ 
and  then  I  began  to  cry  and  Blue  howled  under  the 
kitchen  steps.  Then  Dilsey  stopped  and  we  stopped, 

"Oh/  Caddy  said,  "That's  niggers.  White  folks  dont 
have  funerals." 

Mammy  said  us  not  to  tell  them,  Frony/'  Versh  said, 

Tell  them  what."  Caddy  said. 

Dilsey  moaned,  and  when  it  got  to  the  place  I  began 
fo  cry  and  Blue  howled  under  the  steps.  Luster,  Frony 9 
$aid  in  the  window,  Take  them  down  to  the  barn.  I  cant 
get  no  cooking  done  with  all  that  racket.  That  hound  too. 
Get  them  outen  here. 

I  aint  going  down  there,  Luster  said.  I  might  meet 
pappy  down  there.  I  seen  him  last  night,  waving  his  arms 
in  the  barn. 

"I  like  to  know  why  not."  Frony  said.  "White  folks  dies 
too.  Your  grandmammy  dead  as  any  nigger  can  get,  I 
reckon." 

TDogs  are  dead."  Caddy  said,  "And  when  Nancy  fell  in 


THE     SOUHD     ANB     THE     PTJBY  S3 

the  ditch  and  Roskus  shot  her  and  the  buzzards  came 
and  undressed  her." 

The  bones  rounded  out  of  the  ditch,  where  the  dark 
vines  were  in  the  black  ditch,  into  the  moonlight,  like 
some  of  the  shapes  had  stopped.  Then  they  all  stopped 
and  it  was  dark,  and  when  I  stopped  to  start  again  1 
could  hear  Mother,  and  feet  walking  fast  away,  and  1 
could  smell  it.  Then  the  room  came,  but  my  eyes  went 
shut.  I  didn't  stop.  I  could  smell  it.  T.  P,  unpinned  the 
bed  clothes. 

"Hush."   he   said,   "Shhhhhhhh  " 

But  I  could  smell  it,  T.  P.  pulled  me  up  and  he  put  on 
my  clothes  fast. 

"Hush,  Benjy."  he  said.  'We  going  down  to  our  house* 
You  want  to  go  down  to  our  house,  where  Frony  is* 
Hush.  Shhhhh." 

He  laced  my  shoes  and  put  my  cap  on  and  we  went 
out.  There  was  a  light  in  the  hall.  Across  the  hall  we 
could  hear  Mother. 

"Shhhhhh,  Benjy  "  T.  P.  said,  "Well  be  out  m  a 
minute." 

A  door  opened  and  I  could  smell  it  more  than  evera 
and  a  head  came  out.  It  wasn't  Father.  Father  was  sick 
there. 

"Can  you  take  him  out  of  the  house." 

"That's  where  we  going."  T.  P.  said.  Dilsey  came  up 
the  stairs. 

"Hush."  she  said,  "Hush.  Take  him  down  home,  T.  P. 
Frony  fixing  him  a  bed.  You  all  look  after  him,  now. 
Hush,  Benjy.  Go  on  with  T.  P." 

She  went  where  we  could  hear  Mother. 

"Better  keep  him  there."  It  wasn't  Father.  He  shut  th© 
door,  but  I  could  still  smell  it. 

We  went  down  stairs.  The  stairs  went  down  into  the 


*>4          THE     SOUKB     AISTD     THE     PUR1T 

dark  and  T.  P.  took  my  hand,  and  we  went  out  the  door, 
out  of  the  dark.  Dan  was  sitting  in  the  back  yard,  howl- 
ing. 

"He  smell  it"  T.  P,  said.  "Is  that  the  way  you  found  it 
out/5 

We  went  down  the  steps,  where  our  shadows  were. 

"I  forgot  your  coat."  T.  P.  said.  "You  ought  to  had  it 
But  I  aint  going  back," 

Dan   howled. 

"Hush  now."  T.  P.  said.  Our  shadows  moved,  but  Dan's 
shadow  didn't  move  except  to  howl  when  he  did. 

"I  cant  take  you  down  home,  bellering  like  you  is.1' 
T.  P.  said.  "You  was  bad  enough  before  you  got  that  bull- 
frog voice.  Come  on." 

We  went  along  the  brick  walk,  with  our  shadows. 
The  pig  pen  smelled  like  pigs.  The  cow  stood  in  the  lot, 
chewing  at  us.  Dan  howled. 

"You  going  to  wake  the  whole  town  up."  T.  P,  said, 
*Cant  you  hush." 

We  sa\v  Fancy,  eating  by  die  branch.  The  moon  shone 
on  tie  water  when  we  got  there. 

"Naw,  sir."  T.  P.  said,  "This  too  close.  We  cant  stop 
here.  Come  on.  Now,  just  look  at  you.  Got  your  whole 
leg  wet.  Come  on,  here."  Dan  howled. 

The  ditch  came  up  out  of  the  buzzing  grass.  The  bones 
rounded  out  of  the  black  vines. 

"Now."  T.  P.  said.  "TJeller  your  head  off  if  you  want 
to.  You  got  the  whole  night  and  a  twenty  acre  pasture  to 
beller  in." 

T.  P.  lay  down  in  the  ditch  and  I  sat  down,  watching 
the  bones  where  the  buzzards  ate  Nancy,  flapping  black 
<and  slow  and  heavy  out  of  the  ditch. 

I  had  it  when  we  was  down  here  before,  Luster  said. 


THE     SOtJKB     AND     THE     ^UBT  %% 

I  showed  it  to  you.  Didn't  you  see  it.  I  took  it  out  of  my 
pocket  right  here  and  showed  it  to  you. 

"Do  you  think  buzzards  are  going  to  undress  Da- 
muddy."  Caddy  said.  "You're  crazy/* 

"You're  a  skizzard."  Jason  said.  He  began  to  cry. 

"You're  a  knobnot."  Caddy  said.  Jason  cried.  His  hands 
were  In  his  pockets. 

"Jason  going  to  be  rich  man.'*  Versh  said.  *He  holding 
his  money  all  the  time." 

Jason  cried. 

"Now  youVe  got  him  started."  Caddy  said.  "Hush  up, 
Jason.  How  can  buzzards  get  in  where  Damuddy  is.  Fa^ 
ther  wouldn't  let  them.  Would  you  let  a  buzzard  undress 
you.  Hush  up,  now." 

Jason  hushed.  "Frony  said  it  was  a  funeral"  he  said. 

"Well  it's  not."  Caddy  said.  "It's  a  party.  Frony  dont 
know  anything  about  it.  He  wants  your  lightning  bugs, 
T.  P.  Let  him  hold  it  a  while." 

T.  P.  gave  me  the  bottle  of  lightning  bugs. 

"I  bet  if  we  go  around  to  the  parlor  window  we  can 
see  something."  Caddy  said.  "Then  you'll  believe  me." 

"I  already  knows."  Frony  said.  "I  dont  need  to  see.** 

"You  better  hush  your  mouth,  Frony."  Versh  said* 
"Mammy  going  whip  you." 

'What  is  it."  Caddy  said. 

"I  knows  what  I  knows."  Frony  said. 

"Come  on."  Caddy  said,  "Let*  s  go  around  to  the  front* 

We  started  to  go. 

"T.  P.  wants  his  lightning  bugs."  Frony  said. 

"Let  him  hold  it  a  while  longer,  T.  P."  Caddy  said 
"We'll  bring  it  back." 

"You  all  never  caught  them."  Frony  said. 

"If  I  say  you  and  T.  P,  can  come  too,  will  you  let  him 
hold  it."  Caddy  said. 


J6          THB     SOtJND     AND     THE     FUBY 

"Aint  nobody  said  me  and  T.  P.  got  to  mind  you.*9 
Frony  said. 

"If  I  say  you  dont  have  to,  will  you  let  liiin  hold  it/* 
Caddy  said. 

"All  right"  Frony  said.  "Let  him  hold  it,  T.  P.  We  go- 
ing to  watch  them  moaning." 

"They  aint  moaning/'  Caddy  said.  '1  tell  you  it's  a 
party.  Are  they  moaning,  Versh." 

"We  aint  going  to  know  what  they  doing,  standing 
here."  Versh  said. 

"Come  on."  Caddy  said.  "Frony  and  T.  P.  dont  have  to 
mind  me.  But  the  rest  of  us  do.  You  better  carry  him, 
Versh.  It's  getting  dark." 

Versh  took  me  up  and  we  went  on  around  the  kitchen. 

When  we  looked  around  the  corner  we  could  see  the 
lights  coming  up  the  drive.  T.  P.  went  back  to  the  cellar 
door  and  opened  it. 

You  know  what's  down  there,  T.  P.  said.  Soda  water. 
I  seen  Mr  Jason  come  up  with  both  hands  full  of  them. 
Wait  here  a  minute. 

T.  P.  went  and  looked  in  the  kitchen  door.  Dilsey 
mid,  What  are  you  peeping  in  here  for.  Where's  Benjy. 

He  out  here,  T.  P.  said. 

Go  on  and  watch  him,  Dilsey  said.  Keep  him  out  the 
house  now. 

Yessum,  T.  P.  said.  Is  they  started  yet. 

You  go  on  and  keep  that  boy  out  of  sight,  Dilsey  said. 
I  got  all  I  can  tend  to. 

A  snake  crawled  out  from  under  the  house.  Jason  said 
lie  wasn't  afraid  of  snakes  and  Caddy  said  he  was  but 
she  wasn't  and  Versh  said  they  botii  were  and  Caddy  said 
to  be  quiet,  like  father  said. 

You  aint  got  to  start  bettering  now,  T.  P.  said.  You 
want  some  this  sassprilluh. 


THE  SOUND  AND  THE  FUBT     57 

It  tickled  my  nose  and  eyes. 

If  you  aint  going  to  drink  it,  let  me  get  to  it,  T.  P. 
said.  All  right,  here  tis.  We  better  get  another  bottle  while 
nobody  bothering  us.  You  be  quiet,  now. 

We  stopped  ?ander  the  tree  by  the  parlor  window,, 
Versh  set  me  down  in  the  wet  grass.  It  was  cold.  There 
were  lights  in  all  the  windows. 

'That's  where  Damuddy  is."  Caddy  said.  "She's  siclj 
every  day  now.  When  she  gets  well  we're  going  to  hav€ 
a  picnic." 

"I  knows  what  I  knows/*  Frony  said. 

The  trees  were  buzzing,  and  the  grass. 

"The  one  next  to  it  is  where  we  have  the  measles** 
Caddy  said.  'Where  do  you  and  T.  P.  have  the  measlest, 
Frony." 

"Has  them  just  wherever  we  is,  I  reckon.'3  Frony  said. 

"They  haven't  started  yet."  Caddy  said. 

They  getting  ready  to  start,  T.  P.  said.  You  stand 
right  here  now  while  I  get  that  box  so  we  can  see  in  the 
window.  Here,  les  -finish  drinking  this  here  sassprittuh. 
It  make  me  feel  just  like  a  squinch  owl  inside. 

We  drank  the  sassprilluh  and  T.  P.  pushed  the  bottle 
through  the  lattice,  under  the  house,  and  went  away.  I 
could  hear  them  in  the  parlor  and  I  clawed  my  hands 
against  the  wall.  T.  P.  dragged  the  box.  He  f eU  down* 
and  he  began  to  laugh.  He  lay  there,  laughing  into  the 
grass.  He  got  up  and  dragged  the  box  under  the  window, 
trying  not  to  laugh. 

"I  skeered  I  going  to  holler."  T.  P.  said,  "Git  on  the  boa: 
and  see  is  they  started." 

"They  haven't  started  because  the  band  hasn't 
yet."  Caddy  said. 

"They  aint  going  to  have  no  band."  Frony  said. 

<:How  do  you  know."  Caddy  said. 


5$  THE     SOTJNB     AND     THE     FURY 

*I  knows  what  I  knows."  Frony  said. 

"You  dont  know  anything."  Caddy  said.  She  went  to 
the  tree.  "Push  me  up,  Versh/' 

Tour  paw  told  you  to  stay  out  that  tree."  Versh  said 

*That  was  a  long  time  ago/5  Caddy  said.  "I  expect  he's 
forgotten  about  it.  Besides,  he  said  to  mind  me  tonight. 
Didn't  he  say  to  mind  me  tonight." 

Tm  not  going  to  mind  you."  Jason  said.  "Frony  and 
T.  P.  are  not  going  to  either." 

TPush  me  up,  Versh/'  Caddy  said. 

"AH  right."  Versh  said.  "You  the  one  going  to  get 
whipped.  I  aint"  He  went  and  pushed  Caddy  up  into 
the  tree  to  the  first  limb.  We  watched  the  muddy  bottom 
of  her  drawers.  Then  we  couldn't  see  her.  We  could  hear 
the  tree  thrashing. 

"Mr  Jason  said  if  you  break  that  tree  he  whip  you/' 
Versh  said. 

"I'm  going  to  tell  on  her  too."  Jason  said. 

The  tree  quit  thrashing.  We  looked  up  into  the  still 
branches. 

"What  you  seeing/'  Frony  whispered. 

I  saw  them.  Then  I  saw  Caddy,  with  flowers  in  het 
hair,  and  a  long  veil  like  shining  wind.  Caddy  Caddy 

"Hush/*  T.  P.  said,  "They  going  to  hear  you.  Get  down 
quick."  He  pulled  me.  Caddy.  I  clawed  my  hands  against 
the  wall  Caddy.  T.  P.  pulled  me. 

"Hush."  he  said.  "Hush.  Come  on  here  quick."  He 
pulled  me  on,  Caddy  "Hush  up,  Benjy.  You  want  them 
to  hear  you.  Come  on,  les  drink  some  more  sassprilluh, 
then  we  can  come  back  if  you  hush.  We  better  get  one 
more  bottle  or  we  both  be  hollering.  We  can  say  Dan 
drunk  it.  Mr  Quentin  always  saying  he  so  smart,  we  can 
say  he  sassprilluh  dog,  too." 


THE     SOUND     AND     THE     PITHY          59 

The  moonlight  came  down  the  cellar  stairs.  We  drank 
some  more  sasspriUuh. 

Ton  know  what  I  wish/'  T.  P.  said.  "I  wish  a  bear 
would  walk  in  that  cellar  door.  You  know  what  I  do.  I 
walk  right  up  to  him  and  spit  in  he  eye.  Gimme  that 
bottle  to  stop  my  mouth  before  I  holler." 

T.  P.  fell  down.  He  began  to  laugh,  and  the  cellar  door 
and  the  moonlight  jumped  away  and  something  hit  me. 

"Hush  up."  T.  P.  said,  trying  not  to  laugh,  "Lawd, 
they'll  all  hear  us.  Get  up."  T.  P.  said,  "Get  up,  Benjy, 
quick."  He  was  thrashing  about  and  laughing  and  I  tried 
to  get  up.  The  cellar  steps  ran  up  the  hill  in  the  moon- 
light and  T.  P.  fell  up  the  hill,  into  the  moonlight,  and  I 
ran  against  the  fence  and  T.  P.  ran  behind  me  saying 
"Hush  up  hush  up"  Then  he  fell  into  the  flowers,  laugh- 
ing, and  I  ran  into  the  box.  But  when  I  tried  to  climb 
onto  it  it  jumped  away  and  hit  me  on  the  back  of  the 
head  and  my  throat  made  a  sound.  It  made  the  sound 
again  and  I  stopped  trying  to  get  up,  and  it  made  the 
sound  again  and  I  began  to  cry.  But  my  throat  kept  o® 
making  the  sound  while  T.  P.  was  pulling  me.  It  kept  on 
making  it  and  I  couldn't  tell  if  I  was  crying  or  not,  and 
T.  P.  fell  down  on  top  of  me,  laughing,  and  it  kept  on 
making  the  sound  and  Quentin  kicked  T.  P.  and  Cad 
put  her  arms  around  me?  and  her  shining  veil,  and  J 
couldn't  smell  trees  anymore  and  I  began  to  cry. 

Benjy,  Caddy  said  Benjy.  She  put  her  arms  around  m& 
again,  but  1  went  away.  "What  is  it,  Benjy."  she  said,  "Is 
it  this  hat."  She  took  her  hat  off  and  came  again,  and  I 
went  away. 

"Benjy."  she  said,  "What  is  it,  Benjy.  What  has  Caddy 
done." 

"He  dont  like  that  prissy  dress."  Jason  said.  "You  thint 


€0     THE  SOUND   AND  THE  FUEY 

you're  grown  up,  dont  you.  You  think  you're  better  than 
anybody  else,  dont  you.  Prissy/' 

""You  shut  your  mouth/'  Caddy  said,  "You  dirty  little 
beast  Benjy." 

^Just  because  you  are  fourteen,  you  think  you're  grown 
up,  dont  you."  Jason  said.  "You  think  you're  something. 
Dont  you." 

"Hush,  Benjy."  Caddy  said.  "You'll  disturb  Mother. 
Hush." 

But  I  didn't  hush,  and  when  she  went  away  I  followed, 
£nd  she  stopped  on  the  stairs  and  waited  and  I  stopped 
loo. 

"What  is  it,  Benjy."  Caddy  said,  'Tell  Caddy.  She'll 
Jo  it.  Try." 

"Candace."  Mother  said. 

"Yessum."  Caddy  said. 

"Why  are  you  teasing  him,"  Mother  said.  "Bring  him 
Aere." 

We  went  to  Mother's  room,  where  she  was  lying  with 
the  sickness  on  a  cloth  on  her  head. 

"What  is  the  matter  now."  Mother  said.  "Benjamin." 

TBenjy."  Caddy  said.  She  came  again,  but  I  went  away, 

**You  must  have  done  something  to  him."  Mother  said. 
**Why  wont  you  let  him  alone,  so  I  can  have  some  peace. 
Give  him  the  box  and  please  go  on  and  let  him  alone." 

Caddy  got  the  box  and  set  it  on  the  floor  and  opened 
it.  It  was  full  of  stars.  When  I  was  still,  they  were  still. 
When  I  moved,  they  glinted  and  sparkled.  I  hushed, 

Then  I  heard  Caddy  walking  and  I  began  again. 

"Benjamin."  Mother  said,  "Come  here."  I  went  to  the 
door.  "You,  Benjamin."  Mother  said. 

"What  is  it  now."  Father  said,  "Where  are  you  going." 

"Take  him  downstairs  and  get  someone  to  watch  him3 
Jason."  Mother  said.  "You  know  I'm  ill,  yet  you" 


THE     SOTJKD     AKB     THE     FURY  &* 

Father  shut  the  door  behind  us. 

"T.  P/?  he  said. 

"Sir."  T.  P.  said  downstairs. 

TBenjy's  coming  down."  Father  said.  "Go  with  T.  P.* 

I  went  to  the  bathroom  door.  I  could  hear  the  water. 

"Benjy."  T.  P.  said  downstairs. 

I  could  hear  the  water.  I  listened  to  it. 

"Benjy."  T.  P.  said  downstairs. 

I  listened  to  the  water. 
a  Ijpuldn't  hear  the  water,  and  Caddy  opened  the  door. 

"Why,  Benjy."  she  said.  She  looked  at  me  and  I  went 
and  she  put  her  arms  around  me.  "Did  you  find  Caddy 
again."  she  said.  "Did  you  think  Caddy  had  run  away,,'* 
Caddy  smelled  like  trees. 

We  went  to  Caddy's  room.  She  sat  down  at  the  mirror. 
She  stopped  her  hands  and  looked  at  me. 

'Why,  Benjy.  What  is  it."  she  said.  "You  mustn't  cry. 
Caddy's  not  going  away.  See  here."  she  said.  She  took  up 
the  bottle  and  took  the  stopper  out  and  held  it  to  my 
nose.  "Sweet.  Smell.  Good." 

I  went  away  and  I  didn't  hush,  and  she  held  the  bottle 
in  her  hand,  looking  at  me. 

"Oh."  she  said.  She  put  the  bottle  down  and  came  and 
put  her  arms  around  me.  "So  that  was  it.  And  you  were 
trying  to  tell  Caddy  and  you  couldn't  tell  her.  You 
wanted  to,  but  you  couldn't,  could  you.  Of  course  Caddy 
wont.  Of  course  Caddy  wont.  Just  wait  till  I  dress." 

Caddy  dressed  and  took  up  the  bottle  again  and  we 
went  down  to  the  kitchen. 

"Dilsey."  Caddy  said,  "Benjy's  got  a  present  for  you." 
She  stooped  down  and  put  the  bottle  in  my  hand.  "Hold 
it  out  to  Dilsey,  now."  Caddy  held  my  hand  out  and 
Dilsey  took  the  bottle. 

'Well  111  declare."  Dilsey  said,  "I£  my  baby  aint  giva 


6*          THE     SOUKB     AlSTB     THE     FURY 

Dilsey  a  bottle   of  perfume.  Just  look  here,  Roskus/* 

Caddy  smelled  like  trees,  'We  dont  like  perfume  our- 
selves/' Caddy  said. 

She  smelled  like  trees. 

"Come  on,  now/'  Dilsey  said,  "You  too  big  to  sleep 
with  folks.  You  a  big  boy  now.  Thirteen  years  old.  Big 
enough  to  sleep  by  yourself  in  Uncle  Maury's  room/' 
Dilsey  said. 

Uncle  Maury  was  sick.  His  eye  was  sick,  and  his 
mouth.  Versh  took  his  supper  up  to  him  on  the  tray. 

"Maury  says  he's  going  to  shoot  the  scoundrel."  Father 
said.  "I  told  him  he'd  better  not  mention  it  to  Patterson 
before  hand/'  He  drank, 

"Jason/*  Mother  said. 

"Shoot  who,  Father.**  Quentin  said.  ''What's  Unde 
Maury  going  to  shoot  him  for." 

"Because  he  couldn't  take  a  little  joke."  Father  said. 

"Jason/'  Mother  said,  "How  can  you.  You'd  sit  right 
there  and  see  Maury  shot  down  in  ambush,  and  laugh/* 

"Then  Maury'd  better  stay  out  of  ambush."  Father 
said. 

"Shoot  who,  Father/*  Quentin  said,  'Who's  Uncle 
Maury  going  to  shoot/* 

"Nobody/*  Father  said.  "I  dont  own  a  pistol/* 

Mother  began  to  cry.  "If  you  begrudge  Maury  your 
food,  why  aren't  you  man  enough  to  say  so  to  his  face.  To 
ridicule  him  before  the  children,  behind  his  back." 

"Of  course  I  dont/*  Father  said,  "I  admire  Maury.  He 
is  invaluable  to  my  own  sense  of  racial  superiority,  I 
wouldn't  swap  Maury  for  a  matched  team.  And  do  you 
know  why,  Quentin/* 

"No,  sir."  Quentin  said. 

"Et  ego  in  arcadia  I  have  forgotten  the  latin  for  hay/* 
Father  said.  "There,  there/*  he  said,  "I  was  just  joking/' 


THE  SOUND  AKB  THE  PUBY     63 

He  drank  and  set  the  glass  down  and  went  and  put  his 
hand  on  Mother's  shoulder. 

"It's  no  joke/'  Mother  said.  "My  people  are  every  bit 
as  well  bora  as  yours.  Just  because  Maury  s  health  is 
bad." 

"Of  course/'  Father  said.  "Bad  health  is  the  primary 
reason  for  all  Me.  Created  by  disease,  within  putrefao 
tion,  into  decay.  Versh." 

"Sir/*  Versh  said  behind  my  chair. 

"Take  the  decanter  and  fill  it/* 

"And  tell  Dilsey  to  come  and  take  Benjamin  up  to 
bed/*  Mother  said. 

"You  a  big  boy/'  Dilsey  said,  ''Caddy  tired  sleeping 
with  you.  Hush  now,  so  you  can  go  to  sleep."  The  room 
went  away,  but  I  didn't  hush,  and  the  room  came  back 
and  Dilsey  came  and  sat  on  the  bed,  looking  at  me. 

"Aint  you  going  to  be  a  good  boy  and  hush/'  Dilsey 
said.  "You  aint,  is  you.  See  can  you  wait  a  minute,  then," 

She  went  away.  There  wasn't  anything  in  the  door 
Then  Caddy  was  in  it. 

"Hush/'  Caddy  said.  Tm  coming/' 

I  hushed  and  Dilsey  turned  back  the  spread  and 
Caddy  got  in  between  the  spread  and  the  blanket.  She 
didn't  take  off  her  bathrobe. 

"Now/'  she  said,  "Here  I  am."  Dilsey  came  with  a 
blanket  and  spread  it  over  her  and  tucked  it  around  her. 

"He  be  gone  in  a  minute."  Dilsey  said.  "I  leave  the 
light  on  in  your  room." 

"All  right/'  Caddy  said.  She  snuggled  her  head  beside 
mine  on  the  pillow.  "Goodnight,  Dilsey/* 

"Goodnight,  honey/*  Dilsey  said.  The  room  went  black 
Caddy  smelled  like  trees. 

We  looked  up  into  the  tree  where  sLe  was. 

"What  she  seeing,  Versh/*  Frony  whispeied 


H          THE     SOTJKD     A1STB     T  H  S     FURY 

"Shhhhhhh."  Caddy  said  in  the  tree.  Dilsey  said, 

'"You  come  on  here."  She  came  around  the  corner  of 
the  house.  "Whyn't  you  all  go  on  up  stairs,  like  your  paw 
said,  stead  of  slipping  out  behind  my  back,  Where's 
Caddy  and  Quentin." 

"I  told  her  not  to  climb  up  that  tree."  Jason  said.  *Tm 
going  to  tell  on  her/* 

"Who  in  what  tree."  Dilsey  said.  She  came  and  looked 
up  into  the  tree,  "Caddy."  Dilsey  said.  The  branches 
began  to  shake  again. 

"You,  Satan."  Dilsey  said.  "Come  down  from  there." 

"Hush."  Caddy  said,  "Dont  you  know  Father  said  to 
be  quiet."  Her  legs  came  in  sight  and  Dilsey  reached  up 
and  lifted  her  out  of  the  tree. 

"Arnt  you  got  any  better  sense  than  to  let  them  come 
around  here."  Dilsey  said. 

"I  couldn't  do  nothing  with  her."  Versh  said. 

"What  you  all  doing  here."  Dilsey  said.  "Who  told  you 
to  come  up  to  the  house." 

"She  did."  Frony  said.  "She  told  us  to  come." 

'Who  told  you  you  got  to  do  what  she  say."  Dilsey 
said.  "Get  on  home,  now."  Frony  and  T.  P.  went  on.  We 
couldn't  see  them  when  they  were  still  going  away. 

"Out  here  in  the  middle  of  the  night."  Dilsey  said* 
She  took  me  up  and  we  went  to  the  kitchen. 

''Slipping  out  behind  my  back."  Dilsey  said.  "When 
you  knowed  it's  past  your  bedtime." 

"Shhhh,  Dilsey."  Caddy  said.  "Dont  talk  so  loud.  We've 
got  to  be  quiet." 

"You  hush  your  mouth  and  get  quiet,  then."  Dilsey 
said.  "Where's  Quentin." 

"Quentin's  mad  because  he  had  to  mind  me  tonight.*" 
Caddy  said.  "He's  still  got  T.  P/s  bottle  o£  lightning 
bugs," 


THE     SOUND     AJSTD     THE     FtTEY  6£ 

"I  reckon  T.  P.  can  get  along  without  it."  Dilsey  said, 
**You  go  and  find  Quentin,  Versh.  Roskus  say  he  seen  him 
going  towards  the  barn."  Versh  went  on.  We  couldn't  see 
him. 

"They're  not  doing  anything  in  there."  Caddy  said, 
"Just  sitting  in  chairs  and  looking." 

"They  dont  need  no  help  from  you  all  to  do  that" 
Dilsey  said.  We  went  around  the  kitchen. 

Where  you  want  to  go  now,  Luster  said.  You  going 
back  to  watch  them  knocking  ball  again.  We  done  looked 
for  it  over  there.  Here.  Wait  a  minute.  'You  wait  right 
here  while  I  go  back  and  get  that  ball.  I  done  thought  of 
something. 

The  kitchen  was  dark.  The  trees  were  black  on  the 
sky.  Dan  came  waddling  out  from  under  the  steps  and 
chewed  my  ankle.  I  went  around  the  kitchen,  where  the 
moon  was.  Dan  came  scuffling  along,  into  the  moon. 

"Benjy."  T.  P,  said  in  the  house. 

The  flower  tree  by  the  parlor  window  wasn't  dark,  but 
the  thick  trees  were.  The  grass  was  buzzing  in  the  moon- 
light  where  my  shadow  walked  on  the  grass. 

'"You,  Benjy."  T.  P.  said  in  the  house.  "Where  you 
hiding.  You  slipping  off.  I  knows  it." 

Luster  came  back.  Wait,  he  said.  Here.  Dont  go  over 
there.  Miss  Quentin  and  her  beau  in  the  swing  yonder* 
You  come  on  this  way.  Come  back  here,  Benjy. 

It  was  dark  under  the  trees.  Dan  wouldn't  come.  He 
stayed  in  the  moonlight.  Then  I  could  see  the  swing  and 
I  began  to  cry. 

Come  away  from  there,  Benjy,  Luster  said.  You  know 
Miss  Quentin  going  to  get  mad. 

It  was  two  now,  and  then  one  in  the  swing,  Caddy 
came  fast,  white  in  the  darkness. 


W  THE     SOTTED      £ND      THE      FTJBY 

"Benjy,"  she  said.  "'How  did  you  slip  out.  Where's 
Versh." 

She  put  her  arms  around  me  and  I  hushed  and  held 
to  her  dress  and  tried  to  pull  her  away. 

"Why,  Benjy  "  she  said.  'What  is  it.  T,  P."  she  called. 

The  one  in  the  swing  got  up  and  came,  and  I  cried  and 
pulled  Caddy's  dress. 

"Benjy."  Caddy  said.  "It's  just  Charlie.  Dont  you  know 
Charlie" 

'Where's  his  nigger."  Charlie  said.  'What  do  chey  let 
him  run  around  loose  for." 

"Hush,  Benjy."  Caddy  said.  "Go  away,  Charlie.  He 
doesn't  like  you/'  Charlie  went  away  and  I  hushed.  I 
pulled  at  Caddy's  dress. 

"Why,  Benjy."  Caddy  said.  "Aren't  you  going  to  let 
me  stay  here  and  talk  to  Charlie  awhile." 

"Call  that  nigger."  Charlie  said.  He  came  back.  I 
cried  louder  and  pulled  at  Caddy's  dress. 

"Go  away,  Charlie."  Caddy  said.  Charlie  came  and 
put  his  hands  on  Caddy  and  I  cried  more.  J  cried  loud. 

"No,  no."  Caddy  said.  "No.  No." 

"He  cant  talk."  Charlie  said.  "Caddy /* 

"Are  you  crazy/*  Caddy  said.  She  b^gan  to  breathe 
fast  "He  can  see.  Dont.  Dont."  Caddy  fought.  They  both 
breathed  fast.  "Please.  Please."  Caddy  whispered 

"Send  him  away."  Charlie  said. 

"I  wilL"  Caddy  said.  "Let  me  go." 

"Will  you  send  him  away/'  Charlie  said. 

"Yes."  Caddy  said.  "Let  me  go."  Charlie  went  away* 
"Hush."  Caddy  said.  "He's  gone."  I  hushed.  I  could  hear 
her  and  feel  her  chest  going. 

Til  have  to  take  him  to  the  house/'  she  said.  She  took 
my  hand.  "I'm  coming/'  she  whispered. 

'Wait/'  Charlie  said.  "Call  the  nigger/* 


THE     SCHJND     AXD     THE     1  UBY        ,'6^ 

/'  Caddy  said.  "Ill  come  back.  Come  on,  Benjy/* 

"Caddy."  Charlie  whispered,  loud.  We  went  on.  "Ton 
better  come  back.  Are  you  corning  back/*  Caddy  and  I 
were  running.  "Caddy."  Charlie  said.  We  ran  out  into 
the  moonlight,  toward  the  kitchen. 

"Caddy/*  Charlie  said. 

Tladdy  and  I  ran.  We  ran  up  the  kitchen  steps,  onto 
the  porch,  and  Caddy  knelt  down  in  the  dark  and  held 
me.  I  could  h^ar  her  and  feel  her  chest.  "I  wont."  she 
said.  "I  wont  anymore,  ever.  Benjy.  Benjy/'  Then  she  was 
crying,  and  I  cried,  and  we  held  each  other.  "Hush."  she 
said.  "Hush.  I  wont  anymore."  So  I  hushed  and  Caddy 
got  up  and  we  went  into  the  kitchen  and  turned  the  light 
on  and  Caddy  took  the  kitchen  soap  and  washed  her 
mouth  at  the  sink,  hard.  Caddy  smelled  like  trees. 

I  kept  a  telling  you  to  stay  away  from  there,  Luster 
said.  They  sat  up  in  the  swing,  quick.  Queutin  had  her 
hands  on  her  hair.  He  had  a  red  tie. 

You  old  crazy  loon?  Quentin  said.  Tm  going  to  tell 
Dilsey  about  the  way  you  let  him  follow  everywhere 
I  go.  Tm  going  to  make  her  whip  you  good. 

"I  couldn't  stop  him."  Luster  said.  "Come  on  here} 
Benjy." 

<cYes  you  could."  Quentin  said.  "You  didn't  try.  You 
were  both  snooping  around  after  me.  Did  Grandmother 
send  you  all  out  here  to  spy  on  me."  She  jumped  out 
of  the  swing.  "If  you  dont  take  him  right  away  this  min- 
ute and  keep  him  away,  I'm  going  to  make  Jason  whip 
you/' 

"I  cant,  do  nothing  with  him."  Luster  said.  "You  try 
it  if  you  think  you  can." 

"Shut  your  mouth/*  Quentin  said.  "Are  you  going  to 
get  him  away." 

"Ah,  let  him  stay/*  he  said.  He  had  a  red  tie.  The  sun 


68  THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FURY 

was  red  on  it.  "Look  here,  Jack."  He  struck  a  match  and 
put  It  In  his  mouth.  Then  he  took  the  match  out  of  his 
mouth.  It  was  still  burning.  'Want  to  try  it/'  he  said.  I 
went  over  there.  "Open  your  mouth."  he  said,  I  opened 
my  mouth.  Quentin  hit  the  match  with  her  hand  and  it 
went  away. 

"Goddamn  you."  Quentin  said.  "Do  you  want  to  get 
him  started.  Dont  you  know  hell  beller  all  day.  I'm  going 
to  tell  Dilsey  on  you/'  She  went  away  running. 

"Here,  kid."  he  said.  "Hey.  Come  on  back.  I  aint  going 
to  fool  with  him/' 

Quentin  ran  on  to  the  house.  She  went  around  the 
kitchen, 

"You  played  hell  then,  Jack/'  he  said.  "Aint  you." 

"He  cant  tell  what  you  saying/*  Luster  said.  "He  deef 
and  dumb/' 

"Is/*  he  said.  "How  long's  he  been  that  way/7 

"Been  that  way  thirty-three  years  today/'  Luster  said. 
TBorn  looney.  Is  you  one  of  them  show  folks." 

'Why/'  he  said. 

"I  dont  ricklick  seeing  you  around  here  before/*  Luster 
said. 

"Well,  what  about  it."  he  said. 

"Nothing,"  Luster  said.  "I  going  tonight/' 

He  looked  at  me. 

"You  aint  the  one  can  play  a  tune  on  that  saw,  is  you/* 
Luster  said. 

"It'll  cost  you  a  quarter  to  find  that  out."  he  said.  H© 
looked  at  me.  'Why  dont  they  lock  him  up/'  he  said. 
*What'd  you  bring  him  out  here  for/7 

'"You  aint  talking  to  me."  Luster  said.  "I  cant  do 
nothing  with  him.  I  just  come  over  here  looking  for  a 
quarter  I  lost  so  I  can  go  to  the  show  tonight.  Look  like 
now  I  ain't  going  to  get  to  go."  Luster  looked  on  the 


THE     SOUND     A1STD     THE     FURY  6£ 

ground.  ''You  aint  got  no  extra  quarter,  is  you."  Lustei 
said. 

"No."  he  said.  "I  aint." 

"I  reckon  I  just  have  to  find  that  other  one,  then." 
Luster  said.  He  put  his  hand  in  his  pocket.  "You  dont 
want  to  buy  no  golf  ball  neither,  does  you."  Luster  said. 

"What  kind  of  ball."  he  said. 

"Golf  ball."  Luster  said.  "I  dont  want  but  a  quarter." 

"What  for."  he  said.  "What  do  I  want  with  it." 

"I  didn't  think  you  did."  Luster  said.  "Come  on  here, 
mulehead."  he  said.  "Come  on  here  and  watch  them 
knocking  that  ball.  Here.  Here  something  you  can  play 
with  along  with  that  jimson  weed."  Luster  picked  it  up 
and  gave  it  to  me.  It  was  bright, 

"Where'd  you  get  that."  he  said.  His  tie  was  red  in 
the  sun,  walking. 

"Found  it  under  this  here  bush."  Luster  said.  "I  thought 
for  a  minute  it  was  that  quarter  I  lost' 

He  came  and  took  it. 

"Hush."  Luster  said.  "He  going  to  give  it  back  when 
he  done  looking  at  it." 

"Agnes  Mabel  Becky."  he  said.  He  looked  toward  the 
house. 

"Hush."  Luster  said.  "He  fixing  to  give  it  back." 

He  gave  it  to  me  and  I  hushed. 

"Who  come  to  see  her  last  night."  he  said. 

"I  dont  know."  Luster  said.  "They  comes  every  night 
she  can  climb  down  that  tree.  I  dont  keep  no  track  of 
them." 

"Damn  if  one  of  them  didn't  leave  a  track."  he  said,, 
He  looked  at  the  house.  Then  he  went  and  lay  down  in 
the  swing.  "Go  away."  he  said.  "Dont  bother  me." 

"Come  on  here,"  Luster  said.  "You  done  played  hell 
now.  Time  Miss  Quentin  get  done  telling  on  you." 


70          THE     SOUKD     AND     THE     PUBY 

We  went  to  the  fence  and  looked  through  the  curling 
lower  spaces.  Luster  hunted  in  the  grass. 

"I  had  it  right  here."  he  said.  I  saw  the  flag  flapping., 
and  the  sun  slanting  on  the  broad  grass. 

"They'll  be  some  along  soon."  Luster  said.  "There 
some  now,  but  they  going  away.  Come  on  and  help  me 
look  for  it." 

We  went  along  the  fence. 

"Hush."  Luster  said.  "How  can  I  make  them  come 
,>ver  here,  if  they  aint  coming.  Wait,  They'll  be  some  in 
a  minute.  Look  yonder.  Here  they  come." 

I  went  along  the  fence,  to  the  gate,  where  the  girls 
passed  with  their  booksatchels.  "Yoo,  Benjy."  Luster 
said.  "Come  back  here." 

You  cant  do  no  good  looking  through  the  gate,  T.  P. 
said.  Miss  Caddy  done  gone  long  mays  away.  Done  gai 
married  and  left  you.  You  cant  do  no  good.,  holding  to 
the  gate  and  crying.  She  cant  hear  you. 

What  is  it  he  wants,  T.  P.  Mother  said.  Cant  you  play 
with  him  and  keep  him  quiet. 

He  want  to  go  down  yonder  and  look  through  the  gate* 
T.  P.  said. 

Well,  he  cannot  do  it,  Mother  said.  It's  raining.  "Jou 
will  just  have  to  play  with  him  and  keep  him  quiet.  Hou9 
Benjamin. 

Aint  nothing  going  to  quiet  him,  T.  P.  said.  He  think 
tf  he  dawn  to  the  gate,  Miss  Caddy  come  back. 

Nonsense,  Mother  said. 

I  could  hear  them  talking.  I  went  out  the  door  and  I 
couldn't  hear  them,  and  I  went  down  to  the  gate,  where 
the  girls  passed  with  their  booksatchels.  They  looked  at 
cne,  walking  fast,  with  their  heads  turned.  I  tried  to  say, 
but  they  went  on,  and  I  went  along  the  fence,  trying  to 


SOUND     AND     THU     FTJKY          ?*' 

say,  and  they  went  faster.  Then  they  were  running  and 
I  came  to  the  corner  of  the  fence  and  I  couldn't  go  any 
further,  and  I  held  to  the  fence,  looking  after  them  and 
trying  to  say. 

"You,  Benjy."  T.  P.  said.  "What  you  doing,  slipping 
out.  Dont  you  know  Dilsey  whip  you." 

'"You  cant  do  no  good,  moaning  and  slobbering  through 
the  fence."  T.  P.  said.  "You  done  skeered  them  cMlen. 
Look  at  them,  walking  on  the  other  side  of  the  street" 

How  did  he  get  out,  "Father  said.  Did  you  leave  the 
gate  unlatched  when  you  came  in,  Jason. 

Of  course  not,  Jason  said.  Dont  you  know  I've  got 
better  sense  than  to  do  that.  Do  you  think  I  wanted  any^ 
thing  like  this  to  happen.  This  family  is  bad  enough.,  God 
knows.  I  could  have  told  you,  all  the  time.  I  reckon  youtt 
send  him  to  Jackson,  now.  If  Mrs  Burgess  dont  shoot 
him  first. 

Hush,  Father  said. 

I  could  have  told  you,  all  the  time,  Jason  said. 

It  was  open  when  I  touched  it,  and  I  held  to  it  in  the 
twilight.  I  wasn't  crying,  and  I  tried  to  stop,  watching 
the  girls  coming  along  in  the  twilight.  I  wasn't  crying. 

'There  he  is." 

They  stopped. 

"He  cant  get  out.  He  wont  hurt  anybody,  anyway. 
Come  on." 

*Tm  scared  to.  I'm  scared.  I'm  going  to  cross  the 
.street." 

"He  cant  get  out." 

I  wasn't  crying. 

"'Don't  be  a  'fraid  cat.  Come  on." 

They  came  on  in  the  twilight.  I  wasn't  crying,  and  I 
Jaeld  to  the  gate.  They  came  slow. 


7^  THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FURY 

I'm  scared." 

"He  wont  hurt  you.  I  pass  here  every  day.  He  just 
runs  along  the  fence." 

They  came  on.  I  opened  the  gate  and  they  stopped, 
turning.  I  was  trying  to  say,  and  I  caught  her,  trying  to 
say,  and  she  screamed  and  I  was  trying  to  say  and  try- 
ing and  the  bright  shapes  began  to  stop  and  I  tried  to  get 
out  I  tried  to  get  it  off  of  my  face,  but  the  bright  shapes 
were  going  again.  They  were  going  up  the  hill  to  where 
it  fell  away  and  I  tried  to  cry.  But  when  I  breathed  in, 
I  couldn't  breathe  out  again  to  cry,  and  1  tried  to  keep 
from  falling  off  the  hill  and  I  fell  off  the  hiU  into  the 
bright,  whirling  shapes. 

Here,  loony,  Luster  said.  Here  come  some.  Hush  your 
slobbering  and  moaning,  now. 

They  came  to  the  flag.  He  took  it  out  and  they  hit,  then 
he  put  the  flag  back. 

"Mister."  Luster  said. 

He  looked  around.  ""What."  he  said. 

"Want  to  buy  a  golf  ball."  Luster  said. 

"Let's  see  it."  he  said.  He  came  to  the  fence  and  Luster 
reached  the  ball  through. 

"Where'd  you  get  it.7'  he  said. 

''Found  it."  Luster  said. 

"I  know  that."  he  said.  'Where.  In  somebody's  golf 
bag." 

"I  found  it  laying  over  here  in  the  yard."  Luster  said. 
Til  take  a  quarter  for  it." 

"What  makes  you  think  it's  yours."  he  said. 

"I  found  it."  Luster  said. 

"Then  find  yourself  another  one."  he  said.  He  put  it 
Jn  his  pocket  and  went  away, 

"I  got  to  go  to  that  show  tonight."  Luster  said. 


THE     SOUND     AND     THE     1FUKY  73 

'That  so."  he  said.  He  went  to  the  table.  "Fore,  cad* 
die.**  he  said.  He  hit. 

"I'll  declare."  Luster  said.  "You  fusses  when  you  dont 
see  them  and  you  fusses  when  you  does.  Why  cant  you 
hush.  Dont  you  reckon  folks  gets  tired  of  listening  to 
you  all  the  time.  Here.  You  dropped  your  jimson  weed." 
He  picked  it  up  and  gave  it  back  to  me.  *Tou  needs  a 
new  one.  You  'bout  wore  that  one  out."  We  stood  at  the 
fence  and  watched  them. 

"That  white  man  hard  to  get  along  with."  Luster  said. 
"You  see  him  take  my  ball/'  They  went  on.  We  went  on 
along  the  fence.  We  came  to  the  garden  and  we  couldn't 
go  any  further.  I  held  to  the  fence  and  looked  through  the 
flower  spaces.  They  went  away. 

"Now  you  aint  got  nothing  to  moan  about."  Luster 
said.  "Hush  up.  I  the  one  got  something  to  moan  overs 
you  aint.  Here.  Whyn't  you  hold  on  to  that  weed.  You  be 
bellering  about  it  next/'  He  gave  me  the  flower.  "Where 
you  heading  now." 

Our  shadows  were  on  the  grass.  They  got  to  the  trees 
before  we  did.  Mine  got  there  first.  Then  we  got  there, 
and  then  the  shadows  were  gone.  There  was  a  flower  in 
the  bottle.  I  put  the  other  flower  in  it. 

"Aint  you  a  grown  man,  now."  Luster  said.  "Playing 
with  two  weeds  in  a  bottle.  You  know  what  they  going 
to  do  with  you  when  Miss  Cahline  die.  They  going  to 
send  you  to  Jackson,  where  you  belong.  Mr  Jason  say  so. 
Where  you  can  hold  the  bars  all  day  long  with  the  rest  of 
the  looneys  and  slobber.  How  you  like  that." 

Luster  knocked  the  flowers  over  with  his  hand.  "That's 
what  they'll  do  to  you  at  Jackson  when  you  starts  beller- 
ing." 

I  tried  to  pick  up  the  flowers.  Luster  picked  them  up, 
and  they  went  away.  I  began  to  cry. 


P4  THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FURY 

"Beller."  Luster  said.  "Beller,  You  want  something  to 
beller  about.  All  right,  then.  Caddy."  he  whispered 
"Caddy.  Beller  now.  Caddy/' 

"Luster."  Dilsey  said  from  the  kitchen. 

The  flowers  came  back. 

"Hush."  Luster  said.  "Here  they  is.  Look.  It's  fixed 
back  just  like  it  was  at  first.  Hush,  now.'* 

"You,  Luster."  Dilsey  said. 

"Yessum."  Luster  said.  "We  coming.  You  done  played 
hell.  Get  up."  He  jerked  my  arm  and  I  got  up.  We  went 
out  of  the  trees.  Our  shadows  were  gone. 

"Hush."  Luster  said.  "Look  at  all  them  folks  watching 
you.  Hush." 

"You  bring  him  on  here."  Dilsey  said.  She  came  down 
the  steps. 

"What  you  done  to  him  now."  she  said. 

"Aint  done  nothing  to  him."  Luster  said.  "He  just 
started  bellering." 

"Yes  you  is."  Dilsey  said.  "You  done  something  to  him. 
Where  you  been." 

"Over  yonder  under  them  cedars."  Luster  said. 

"Getting  Quentin  all  riled  up  "  Dilsey  said.  "Why  can't 
you  keep  him  away  from  her.  Dont  you  know  she  dorA 
like  him  where  she  at." 

"Got  as  much  time  for  him  as  I  is."  Luster  said.  "He 
aint  none  of  my  uncle." 

"Dont  you  sass  me,  nigger  boy."  Dilsey  said. 

"I  aint  done  nothing  to  him."  Luster  said.  "He  was 
playing  there,  and  all  of  a  sudden  he  started  bellering." 

"Is  you  been  projecking  with  his  graveyard."  Dilsey 
said. 

"I  aint  touched  his  graveyard."  Luster  said. 

"Dont  lie  to  me,  boy."  Dilsey  said.  We  went  up  the 
steps  and  into  the  kitchen.  Dilsey  opened  the  firedoot 


THE  SOUKB  ANB  THE  FURY    75 

and  drew  a  chair  tip  in  front  of  it  and  I  sat  down.  I 
hushed. 

What  you  want  to  get  her  started  for,  Dilsey  said, 
Whyrit  you  keep  him  out  of  there. 

He  was  just  looking  at  the  fire,  Caddy  said.  Mother 
was  telling  him  his  new  name.  We  didnt  mean  to  get 
her  started. 

I  knows  you  didnt ,  Dilsey  said.  Him  at  one  end  of  the 
house  and  her  at  the  other.  You  let  my  things  alone,  now. 
Dont  you  touch  nothing  till  I  get  back. 

"Aint  you  shamed  of  yourself."  Dilsey  said.  "Teasing 
him."  She  set  the  cake  on  the  table. 

"I  aint  been  teasing  him."  Luster  said.  "He  was  playing 
with  that  bottle  full  of  dogfennel  and  all  of  a  sudden  he 
started  up  bellering.  You  heard  him." 

"You  aint  done  nothing  to  his  flowers."  Dilsey  said. 

"I  aint  touched  his  graveyard."  Luster  said.  "What  I 
want  with  his  truck.  I  was  just  hunting  for  that  quarter.*" 

"You  lost  it,  did  you."  Dilsey  said.  She  lit  the  candles 
on  the  cake.  Some  of  them  were  little  ones.  Some  were 
big  ones  cut  into  little  pieces.  "I  told  you  to  go  put  it 
away.  Now  I  reckon  you  want  me  to  get  you  anothei 
one  from  Frony." 

"I  got  to  go  to  that  show,  Benjy  or  no  Benjy."  Luster 
said.  "I  aint  going  to  follow  him  around  day  and  nighi 
both." 

"You  going  to  do  just  what  he  want  you  to,  nigger 
boy."  Dilsey  said.  "You  hear  me." 

"Aint  I  always  done  it."  Luster  said.  TDonfc  I  always 
does  what  he  wants.  Dont  I,  Benjy." 

"Then  you  keep  it  up."  Dilsey  said.  "Bringing  him 
In  here,  bawling  and  getting  her  started  too.  You  all  go 
ahead  and  eat  this  cake,  now,  before  Jason  come.  1 
dont  want  him  jumping  on  me  about  a  cake  I  bough* 


7^          THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FURY 

with  my  own  money.  Me  baking  a  cake  here,  with  him 
counting  every  egg  that  comes  into  this  kitchen.  See  can 
you  let  him  alone  now,  less  you  dont  want  to  go  to  that 
show  tonight." 

Dilsey  went  away. 

'"You  cant  blow  out  no  candles."  Luster  said.  'Watch 
me  blow  them  out."  He  leaned  down  and  puffed  his  face. 
The  candles  went  away.  I  began  to  cry.  "Hush."  Luster 
said.  "Here.  Look  at  the  fire  whiles  I  cuts  this  cake." 

I  could  hear  the  clock)  and  I  could  hear  Caddy  stand- 
ing behind  me,  and  I  could  hear  the  roof.  It's  still  rain" 
ing,  Caddy  said.  I  hate  rain.  I  hate  everything.  And  then 
her  head  came  into  my  lap  and  she  was  crying,  holding 
me,  and  I  began  to  cry.  Then  I  looked  at  the  fire  again 
and  the  bright,  smooth  shapes  went  again.  I  could  hear 
the  clock  and  the  roof  and  Caddy. 

I  ate  some  cake.  Luster's  hand  came  and  took  another 
piece.  I  could  hear  him  eating.  I  looked  at  the  fire, 

A  long  piece  of  wire  came  across  my  shoulder.  It  went 
to  the  door,  and  then  the  fire  went  away.  I  began  to  cry* 

"What  you  howling  for  now."  Luster  said.  "Look 
there."  The  fire  was  there.  I  hushed.  "Cant  you  set  and 
look  at  the  fire  and  be  quiet  like  mammy  told  you." 
Luster  said.  **You  ought  to  be  ashamed  of  yourself.  Here. 
Here's  you  some  more  cake." 

'What  you  done  to  him  now."  Dilsey  said.  "Cant  you 
never  let  him  alone." 

"I  was  just  trying  to  get  him  to  hush  up  and  not  sturb 
Miss  Cahline."  Luster  said.  "Something  got  him  started 
again." 

"And  I  know  what  that  something  name."  Dilsey  said. 
'Tm  going  to  get  Versh  to  take  a  stick  to  you  when  he 
.comes  home.  You  just  trying  yourself.  You  been  doing 
it  all  day.  Did  you  take  him  down  to  the  branch/* 


THE     SOUtKTD     AND     THE     IFTJRY           77 

"Nome."  Luster  said.  <cWe  been  right  here  in  this  yard 
all  day,  like  you  said." 

His  hand  came  for  another  piece  of  cake.  Dilsey  hit 
his  hand.  "Reach  it  again,  and  I  chop  it  right  off  with 
this  here  butcher  knife."  Dilsey  said.  <el  bet  he  aint  had 
one  piece  of  it." 

"Yes  he  is."  Luster  said.  "He  already  had  twice  as 
much  as  me.  Ask  him  if  he  aint." 

"Reach  hit  one  more  time."  Dilsey  said.  "Just  reach,  it.91 

That's  right,  Dilsey  said.  I  reckon  it'll  be  my  time  to 
cry  next.  Reckon  Maury  going  to  let  me  cry  on  him  a 
while,  too. 

His  name's  Benjy  now,  Caddy  said. 

How  come  it  is,  Dilsey  said.  He  aint  wore  out  the  name 
he  was  born  with  yet,  is  he. 

Benjamin  came  out  of  the  bible,  Caddy  said.  It's  a 
better  name  for  him  than  Maury  was. 

How  come  it  is,  Dilsey  said. 

Mather  says  it  is,  Caddy  said. 

Huh,  Dilsey  said.  Name  aint  going  to  help  him.  Hurt 
him,  neither.  Folks  dont  have  no  luck,  changing  names. 
My  name  been  Dilsey  since  fore  I  could  remember  and  it 
be  Dilsey  when  theys  long  forgot  me. 

How  will  they  know  it's  Dilsey,  when  it's  long  forgot, 
Dilsey,  Caddy  said. 

It'll  be  in  the  Book,  honey,  Dilsey  said.  Writ  out. 

Can  you  read  it,  Caddy  said. 

Wont  have  to,  Dilsey  said.  They'll  read  it  for  me.  All 
I  got  to  do  is  say  Ise  here. 

The  long  wire  came  across  my  shoulder,  and  the  fire 
went  away.  I  began  to  cry. 

Dilsey  and  Luster  fought. 

"I  seen  you."  Dilsey  said.  "Oho,  I  seen  you.**  She 
dragged  Luster  out  of  the  corner,  shaking  him.  "Wasn't 


78  THE     SOUISTB      AND     THE     FURY 

nothing  bothering  him,  was  they.  You  just  wait  till  your 
pappy  come  home.  I  wish  I  was  young  like  I  use  to  be, 
I'd  tear  them  years  right  off  your  head.  I  good  mind  to 
lock  you  up  m  that  cellar  and  not  let  you  go  to  that  show 
tonight,  I  sho  is." 

"Ow,  mammy ."  Luster  said.  *Ow,  mammy ." 
I  put  my  hand  out  to  where  the  fire  had  been, 
"Catch  him."  Dilsey  said.  "Catch  him  back/' 
My  hand  jerked  back  and  I  put  it  in  my  mouth  and 
Dilsey  caught  me.  I  could  still  hear  the  clock  between 
my  voice.  Dilsey  reached  back  and  hit  Luster  on  the 
head.  My  voice  was  going  loud  every  time. 

"Get  that  soda/'  Dilsey  said.  She  took  my  hand  out  of 
my  mouth.  My  voice  went  louder  then  and  my  hand  tried 
to  go  back  to  my  mouth,  but  Dilsey  held  it.  My  voice 
went  loud.  She  sprinkled  soda  on  my  hand. 

"Look  in  the  pantry  and  tear  a  piece  off  of  that  rag 
hanging  on  the  nail/'  she  said.  "Hush,  now.  You  dont 
Want  to  make  your  ma  sick  again,  does  you.  Here,  look 
at  the  fire.  Dilsey  make  your  hand  stop  hurting  in  just 
a  minute.  Look  at  the  fire/'  She  opened  the  fire  door.  I 
looked  at  the  fire,  but  my  hand  didn't  stop  and  I  didn't 
stop.  My  hand  was  trying  to  go  to  my  mouth  but  Dilsey 
h^ld  it. 

She  wrapped  the  cloth  around  it.  Mother  said, 
"What  is  it  now.  Cant  I  even  be  sick  in  peace.  Do  I 
have  to  get  up  out  of  bed  to  come  down  to  him,  with  two 
grown  negroes  to  take  care  of  him." 

"He  all  right  now."  Dilsey  said.  "He  going  to  quit 
He  just  burnt  his  hand  a  little." 

"With  two  grown  negroes,  you  must  bring  him  into 
the  house,  bawling."  Mother  said.  "You  got  him  started 
on  purpose,  because  you  know  I'm  sick."  She  came  and 


THE     SOUND     A1STD     THE     FTJB.Y          7$ 

stood  by  me.  "Hush."  she  said.  "Right  this  minute.  Did 
you  give  him  this  cake." 

"I  bought  it."  Dilsey  said.  "It  never  come  out  of  Ja- 
son's pantry.  I  fixed  him  some  birthday." 

"Do  you  want  to  poison  him  with  that  cheap  store 
cake."  Mother  said.  "Is  that  what  you  are  trying  to  do. 
Am  I  never  to  have  one  minute's  peace/" 

"You  go  on  back  up  stairs  and  lay  down."  Dilsey  said 
"It'll  quit  smarting  him  in  a  minute  now,  and  he'll  hush 
Come  on,  now." 

"And  leave  him  down  here  for  you  all  to  do  something 
else  to."  Mother  said.  "How  can  I  lie  there,  with  him 
bawling  down  here.  Benjamin.  Hush  this  minute." 

"They  aint  nowhere  else  to  take  him."  Dilsey  said.  "We 
aint  got  the  room  we  use  to  have.  He  cant  stay  out  in 
the  yard,  crying  where  all  the  neighbors  can  see  him." 

"I  know,  I  know."  Mother  said.  "It's  all  my  fault.  Ill 
be  gone  soon,  and  you  and  Jason  will  both  get  along 
better."  She  began  to  cry. 

"You  hush  that,  now."  Dilsey  said.  "You'll  get  your- 
self down  again.  You  come  on  back  up  stairs.  Luster 
going  to  take  him  lo  the  liberty  and  play  with  him  till 
I  get  his  supper  done." 

Dilsey  and  Mother  went  out. 

"Hush  up."  Luster  said.  "You  hush  up.  You  want 
me  to  burn  your  other  hand  for  you.  You  aint  hurt.  Hush 

y> 

up. 

"Here."  Dilsey  said.  "Stop  crying,  now."  She  gave  me 
the  slipper,  and  I  hushed.  "Take  him  to  the  liberry." 
she  said.  "And  if  I  hear  him  again,  I  going  to  whip  you 
myself." 

We  went  to  the  library.  Luster  turned  on  the  light, 
The  windows  went  black,  and  the  dark  tall  place  on 


to          THE     SOIHSTD     AND     THE 

the  wall  came  and  I  went  and  touched  it.  It  was  like  a 
door,  only  it  wasn't  a  door. 

The  fire  came  behind  me  and  I  went  to  the  fire  and 
sat  on  the  floor,  holding  the  slipper.  The  fire  went  higher. 
It  went  onto  the  cushion  in  Mother's  chair. 

"Hush  up."  Luster  said.  "Cant  you  never  get  done  for 
a  while.  Here  I  done  built  you  a  fire,  and  you  wont  even 
look  at  it" 

Your  name  is  Benjy.  Caddy  said.  Do  you  hear.  Benjy. 
Benjy. 

Dent  tell  him  that,  Mother  said.  Bring  him  here. 

Caddy  lifted  me  under  the  arms. 

Get  up,  Mau I  mean  Benjy,  she  said. 

Dont  try  to  carry  him,  Mother  said.  Cant  you  lead 
him  over  here.  Is  that  too  much  for  you  to  think  of. 

1  can  carry  him,  Caddy  said.  "Let  me  carry  him  up, 
Dilsey.* 

"Go  on,  Minute."  Dilsey  said.  "You  aint  big  enough 
to  tote  a  flea.  You  go  on  and  be  quiet,  like  Mr  Jason 
said." 

There  was  a  light  at  the  top  of  the  stairs.  Father  was 
there,  in  his  shirt  sleeves.  The  way  he  looked  said  Hush. 
Caddy  whispered, 

"Is  Mother  sick/' 

Versh  set  me  down  and  we  went  into  Mothers  room. 
There  was  a  fire.  It  was  rising  and  falling  on  the  walls. 
There  was  another  fire  in  the  mirror.  I  could  smell  the 
sickness.  It  was  a  cloth  folded  on  Mothers  head.  Her 
hair  was  on  the  pillow.  The  fire  didnt  reach  ity  but  it 
shone  on  her  hand,  where  her  rings  were  jumping. 

"Come  and  tell  Mother  goodnight/'  Caddy  said.  We 
went  to  the  bed.  The  fire  went  out  of  the  mirror.  Father 
got  up  from  the  bed  and  lifted  me  up  and  Mother  put 
bar  hand  on  my  head. 


THE  SOUND  AND  THE  FURY    8l 

"What  time  is  it."  Mother  said.  Her  eyes  were  closed, 

"Ten  minutes  to  seven.*'  Father  said. 

"It's  too  early  for  him  to  go  to  bed."  Mother  said. 
*He'll  wake  up  at  daybreak,  and  I  simply  cannot  bear 
another  day  like  today." 

"There,  there."  Father  said.  He  touched  Mother's  face. 

"I  know  I'm  nothing  but  a  burden  to  you."  Mother 
said.  "But  I'll  be  gone  soon.  Then  you  will  be  rid  of  my 
bothering." 

"Hush."  Father  said.  "I'll  take  him  downstairs  awhile.*1 
He  took  me  up.  "Come  on,  old  fellow.  Let's  go  down- 
stairs  awhile.  We'll  have  to  be  quiet  while  Quentin  is 
studying,  now." 

Caddy  went  and  leaned  her  face  over  the  bed  and 
Mother's  hand  came  into  the  firelight.  Her  rings  jumped 
on  Caddy's  back. 

Mothers  sick,  Father  said.  Dilsey  will  put  you  to  bed. 
Where's  Quentin. 

Versh  getting  him,  Dilsey  said. 

Father  stood  and  watched  us  go  past.  We  could  hea* 
Mother  in  her  room.  Caddy  said  "Hush."  Jason  was  still 
climbing  the  stairs.  He  had  his  hands  in  his  pockets. 

"You  all  must  be  good  tonight."  Father  said.  "And  be 
quiet,  so  you  wont  disturb  Mother." 

"We'll  be  qmet."  Caddy  said.  "You  must  be  quiet  now, 
Jason."  she  said.  We  tiptoed. 

We  could  hear  the  roof.  I  could  see  the  fire  in  the 
mirror  too.  Caddy  lifted  me  again. 

"Come  on,  now."  she  said,  "Then  you  can  come  back 
to  the  fire.  Hush,  now." 

"Candace."  Mother  said. 

"Hush,  Benjy."  Caddy  said.  "Mother  wants  you  a 
minute.  Like  a  good  boy.  Then  you  can  come  back 
Benjy" 


82  THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FXJKY 

Caddy  let  me  down,  and  I  hushed. 

"Let  him  stay  here,  Mother.  When  he's  through  look- 
ing at  the  fire,  then  you  can  tell  him." 

"Candace."  Mother  said.  Caddy  stooped  and  lifted  me. 
We  staggered.  "Candace."  Mother  said. 

"Hush."  Caddy  said.  "You  can  still  see  it.  Hush.' 

"Bring  him  here."  Mother  said.  "He's  too  big  for  you 
to  carry.  You  must  stop  trying.  You'll  injure  your  back. 
All  of  our  women  have  prided  themselves  on  their  car- 
riage. Do  you  want  to  look  like  a  washer-woman." 

"He's  not  too  heavy."  Caddy  said.  "I  can  carry  him.9* 

"Well,  I  dont  want  him  carried,  then."  Mother  said. 
"A  five  year  old  child.  No,  no.  Not  in  my  lap.  Let  him 
stand  up." 

"If  you'll  hold  him,  he  11  stop."  Caddy  said.  "Hush." 
she  said.  "You  can  go  right  back.  Here.  Here's  your 
cushion.  See." 

"Dont,  Candace."  Mother  said. 

"Let  him  look  at  it  and  he'll  be  quiet."  Caddy  said* 
"Hold  up  just  a  minute  while  I  slip  it  out.  There,  Benjy. 
Look." 

I  looked  at  it  and  hushed. 

"You  humour  him  too  much."  Mother  said.  "You  and 
your  father  both.  You  dont  realise  that  I  am  the  one  who 
has  to  pay  for  it.  Damuddy  spoiled  Jason  that  way  and 
it  took  him  two  years  to  outgrow  it,  and  I  am  not  strong 
enough  to  go  through  the  same  thing  with  Benjamin." 

"You  dont  need  to  bother  with  him."  Caddy  said.  "I 
like  to  take  care  of  him.  Dont  I,  Benjy." 

"Candace."  Mother  said.  "I  told  you  not  to  call  him 
that.  It  was  bad  enough  when  your  father  insisted  on 
calling  you  by  that  silly  nickname,  and  I  will  not  have 
him  called  by  one.  Nicknames  axe  vulgar.  Only  common 
people  use  them.  Benjamin."  she  said 


THCE     SOUND     AND     THE     FURY          §3 

"Look  at  me."  Mother  said. 

"Benjamin/'  she  said.  She  took  my  face  in  her  hands 
and  turned  it  to  hers. 

"Benjamin/*  she  said.  "Take  that  cushion  away,  Can- 
dace/* 

"Hell  cry/'  Caddy  said. 

"Take  that  cushion  away,  like  I  told  you/'  Mother  saidl 
"He  must  learn  to  mind/* 

The  cushion  went  away. 

"Hush,  Benjy/'  Caddy  said. 

"You  go  over  there  and  sit  down.**  Mother  said.  "Ben- 
jamin/* She  held  my  face  to  hers. 

"Stop  that/'  she  said.  "Stop  it." 

But  I  didn't  stop  and  Mother  caught  me  in  her  arms 
and  began  to  cry,  and  I  cried.  Then  the  cushion  came 
back  and  Caddy  held  it  above  Mother's  head.  She  drew 
Mother  back  in  the  chair  and  Mother  lay  crying  against 
the  red  and  yellow  cushion. 

"Hush,  Mother."  Caddy  said.  "You  go  upstairs  and 
lay  down,  so  you  can  be  sick.  I'll  go  get  Dilsey/*  She  led 
me  to  the  fire  and  I  looked  at  the  bright,  smooth  shapes. 
I  could  hear  the  fire  and  the  roof. 

Father  took  me  up.  He  smelled  like  rain. 

"Well,  Benjy/*  he  said.  "Have  you  been  a  good  boy 
today/* 

Caddy  and  Jason  were  fighting  in  the  mirror. 

"You,  Caddy."  Father  said. 

They  fought.  Jason  began  to  cry. 

"Caddy/*  Father  said.  Jason  was  crying.  He  wasn't 
fighting  any  more,  but  we  could  see  Caddy  fighting  in 
the  mirror  and  Father  put  me  down  and  went  into  the 
mirror  and  fought  too.  He  lifted  Caddy  up.  She  fought. 
Jason  lay  on  the  floor,  crying.  He  had  the  scissors  in  his 
hand.  Father  held  Caddy. 


84    THE  SOUND  AND  THE  FURY 

"He  cut  up  all  Benjy's  dolls."  Caddy  said.  Til  slit  his 
gizzle." 

"Candace."  Father  said. 

"I  will."  Caddy  said.  "I  will"  She  fought.  Father  held 
her.  She  kicked  at  Jason.  He  rolled  into  the  corner,  out 
of  the  mirror.  Father  brought  Caddy  to  the  fire.  They 
were  all  out  of  the  mirror.  Only  the  fire  was  in  it.  Like 
the  fire  was  in  a  door, 

"Stop  that."  Father  said,  "Do  you  want  to  make 
Mother  sick  in  her  room.'* 

Caddy  stopped.  "He  cut  up  all  the  dolls  Mau — Benjy 
and  I  made."  Caddy  said.  "He  did  it  just  for  meanness." 

"I  didn't/'  Jason  said.  He  was  sitting  up,  crying.  "I 
didn't  know  they  were  his.  I  just  thought  they  were  some 
old  papers." 

"You  couldn't  help  but  know."  Caddy  said.  "You  did 
it  just." 

"Hush,"  Father  said.  "Jason  "  he  said. 

"I'll  make  you  some  more  tomorrow.'*  Caddy  said. 
'We'll  make  a  lot  of  them.  Here,  you  can  look  at  tha 
cushion,  too." 

Jason  came  in. 

I  kept  telling  you  to  hush,  Luster  said. 

What's  the  matter  now,  Jason  said. 

"He  just  trying  hisself."  Luster  said.  "That  the  way  he 
been  going  on  all  day." 

"Why  dont  you  let  him  alone,  then."  Jason  said.  "If 
you  cant  keep  him  quiet,  you'll  have  to  take  him  out  to 
the  kitchen.  The  rest  of  us  cant  shut  ourselves  up  in  a 
room  like  Mother  does." 

"Mammy  say  keep  him  out  the  kitchen  till  she  get 
supper."  Luster  said. 

"Then  play  with  him  and  keep  him  quiet/*  Jason  said. 


THE  SOUND  AND  THE  FUB-Y     $S 

*Do  I  have  to  work  all  day  and  then  come  home  to  a 
tnad  house."  He  opened  the  paper  and  read  It 

You  can  look  at  the  fire  and  the  mirror  and  the  cushion 
too,  Caddy  said.  You  wont  have  to  wait  until  supper  to 
look  at  the  cushion,  now.  We  could  hear  the  roof.  We 
could  hear  Jason  too,  crying  loud  beyond  the  wall. 

Dilsey  said,  "You  come,  Jason.  You  letting  him  alone, 
Is  you." 

"Yessum."  Luster  said. 

'Where  Quentin."  Dilsey  said.  "'Slipper  near  bout 
ready." 

"I  dont  know'm."  Luster  said.  "I  aint  seen  her." 

Dilsey  went  away.  "Quentin."  she  said  in  the  hall* 
"Quentin.  Supper  ready/* 

We  could  hear  the  roof.  Quentin  smelted  like  -rain, 
too. 

What  did  Jason  do,  he  said. 

He  cut  up  all  Eenjys  dolls,  Caddy  said. 

Mather  said  to  not  call  him  Benjy,  Quentin  said.  He 
sat  on  the  rug  by  us.  I  wish  it  wouldnt  rain,  he  said* 
You  cant  do  anything. 

Youve  been  in  a  fight,  Caddy  said.  Haven  t  you. 

It  wasnt  much,  Quentin  said. 

You  can  tell  it,  Caddy  said.  Father'll  see  it. 

I  dont  care,  Quentin  said.  I  wish  it  wouldnt  rain. 

Quentin  said,  "Didn't  Dilsey  say  supper  was  ready." 

**Yessum."  Luster  said.  Jason  looked  at  Quentin.  Then 
he  read  the  paper  again.  Quentin  came  in,  "She  say  it 
bout  ready."  Luster  said.  Quentin  jumped  down  in 
Mother's  chair.  Luster  said, 

"Mr  Jason." 

"What."  Jason  said. 

"Let  me  have  two  bits."  Luster  said. 

"What  for."  Jason  said- 


16          THE     SOUND     AKJD     THE     FURY 

To  go  to  the  show  tonight."  Luster  said. 

"I  thought  Dilsey  was  going  to  get  a  quarter  from 
Frony  for  you."  Jason  said. 

"She  did."  Luster  said.  "I  lost  it  Me  and  Eenjy  hunted 
all  day  for  that  quarter.  You  can  ask  him." 

"Then  borrow  one  from  him/'  Jason  said.  "I  have  to 
Work  for  mine."  He  read  the  paper.  Quentin  looked  at 
the  fire.  The  fire  was  in  her  eyes  and  on  her  mouth.  Hei 
mouth  was  red. 

*!  tried  to  keep  him  away  from  there."  Luster  said. 

"Shut  your  mouth."  Quentin  said.  Jason  looked  at  her. 

"What  did  I  tell  you  I  was  going  to  do  if  I  saw  you 
With  that  show  fellow  again/*  he  said.  Quentin  looked  at 
the  fire.  "Did  you  hear  me."  Jason  said. 

"I  heard  you."  Quentin  said.  "Why  dont  you  do  it, 
then." 

"Dont  you  worry."  Jason  said. 

Tig  not."  Quentin  said.  Jason  read  the  paper  again. 

I  could  hear  the  roof.  Father  leaned  forward  and 
looked  at  Quentin. 

Hello,  he  said.  Who  won. 

"Nobody."  Quentin  said.  They  stopped  us.  Teachers." 

'Who  was  it."  Father  said.  "Will  you  tell." 

"It  was  all  right."  Quentin  said.  "He  was  as  big  as  me." 

That's  good."  Father  said.  "Can  you  tell  what  it  was 
about." 

"It  wasn't  anything."  Quentin  said.  "He  said  he  would 
put  a  frog  in  her  desk  and  she  wouldn't  dare  to  whip 
him." 

"Oh."  Father  said.  "She.  And  then  what." 

"Yes,  sir."  Quentin  said,  "And  then  I  kind  of  hit  him.'* 

We  could  hear  the  roof  and  the  fire,  and  a  snuffling 
outside  the  door* 


THE     SOTJHD     AND     THE     FUBY          $? 

was  lie  going  to  get  a  frog  in  November."* 
Father  said. 

"I  dont  know,  sir."  Quentin  said. 

We  could  hear  them. 

"Jason."  Father  said.  We  could  hear  Jason, 

"Jason."  Father  said.  "Come  in  here  and  stop  that* 

We  could  hear  the  roof  and  the  fire  and  Jason. 

"Stop  that,  now."  Father  said.  "Do  you  want  me  to 
whip  you  again/'  Father  lifted  Jason  up  into  the  chaii 
by  him.  Jason  snuffled.  We  could  hear  the  fire  and  Jiw 
roof.  Jason  snuffled  a  little  louder. 

"One  more  time."  Father  said.  We  could  hear  the  fire 
and  the  roof. 

Dilsey  said,  All  right.  Jou  all  can  come  on  to  supper, 

Versh  smelled  like  rain.  He  smelled  like  a  dog,  too. 
We  could  hear  the  fire  and  the  roof. 

We  could  hear  Caddy  walking  fast.  Father  and  Mother 
looked  at  the  door.  Caddy  passed  it,  walking  fast.  Sh& 
didn't  look.  She  walked  fast. 

"Candace."  Mother  said.  Caddy  stopped  walking. 

"Yes,  Mother."  she  said. 

"Hush,  Caroline."  Father  said. 

"Come  here/'  Mother  said. 

"Hush,  Caroline."  Father  said.  "Let  her  alone/* 

Caddy  came  to  the  door  and  stood  there,  looking  ar 
Father  and  Mother.  Her  eyes  flew  at  me,  and  away.  1 
began  to  cry.  It  went  loud  and  I  got  up.  Caddy  came  in 
and  stood  with  her  back  to  the  wall,  looking  at  me.  I 
went  toward  her,  crying,  and  she  shrank  against  the  wall 
and  I  saw  her  eyes  and  I  cried  louder  and  pulled  at  her 
dress.  She  put  her  hands  out  but  I  pulled  at  her  dress. 
Her  eyes  ran. 

Versh  mid,  Jour  name  Benjamin  now.  YAU  know  how 


88  THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FTTRY 

come  your  name  Benjamin  now.  They  making  a  bluegum 
out  of  you.  Mammy  say  in  old  time  your  granpa  changed 
niggers  name,  and  he  turn  preacher,  and  when  they  look 
at  him,  he  bluegum  too.  Didn't  use  to  be  bluegum, 
neither.  And  when  family  woman  look  him  in  the  eye  in 
the  full  of  the  moon,  chile  born  bluegum.  And  one  eve- 
ning, when  they  was  about  a  dozen  them  bluegum  chillen 
running  round  the  place,  he  never  come  home.  Possum 
hunters  found  him  in  the  woods,  et  clean.  And  you 
know  who  et  him.  Them  bluegum  chillen  did. 

We  were  in  the  hall.  Caddy  was  still  looking  at  me. 
Her  hand  was  against  her  mouth  and  I  saw  her  eyes 
and  I  cried.  We  went  up  the  stairs.  She  stopped  again, 
against  the  wall,  looking  at  me  and  I  cried  and  she 
went  on  and  I  came  on,  crying,  and  she  shrank  against 
the  wall,  looking  at  me.  She  opened  the  door  to  her 
room,  but  I  pulled  at  her  dress  and  we  went  to  the  bath- 
room and  she  stood  against  the  door,  looking  at  me. 
Then  she  put  her  arm  across  her  face  and  I  pushed  at 
her,  crying. 

What  are  you  doing  to  him,  Jason  said.  Why  cant  you 
let  him  alone. 

I  aint  touching  him,  Luster  said.  He  been  doing  this 
way  all  day  long.  He  needs  whipping. 

He  needs  to  be  sent  to  Jackson,  Quentin  said.  How 
can  anybody  live  in  a  house  like  this. 

If  you  dont  like  it,  young  lady,  youd  better  get  out, 
Jason  said. 

I'm  going  to,  Quentin  said.  Dont  you  worry. 

Versh  said,  "You  move  back  some,  so  I  can  dry  my 
legs  off."  He  shoved  me  back  a  little.  "Dont  you  start 
bellering,  now.  You  can  still  see  it.  That's  all  you  have  to 
do.  You  aint  had  to  be  ou£  in  the  rain  like  1  is.  You's  born 


THE     SOTTED     AKD^THE     FURY  $9 

lucky  and  dont  know  it."  He  lay  on  his  back  before  the 
fire. 

"You  know  how  come  your  name  Benjamin  now/' 
Versh  said.  'Tour  mamma  too  proud  for  you.  What 
mammy  say/' 

""You  be  still  there  and  let  me  dry  my  legs  off."  Versh 
said.  "Or  you  know  what  111  do.  I'll  skin  your  rinktiim/* 

We  could  hear  the  fire  and  the  roof  and  Versh. 

Versh  go*"  up  quick  and  jerked  his  legs  back.  Fathef- 
said,  "All  right,  Versh." 

"Ill  feed  him  tonight."  Caddy  said.  "Sometimes  he 
cries  when  Versh  feeds  him." 

"Take  this  tray  up,"  Dilsey  said.  "And  hurry  back  and 
feed  Benjy," 

"Dont  you  want  Caddy  to  feed  you."  Caddy  said. 

Has  he  got  to  keep  that  old  dirty  slipper  on  the  table, 
Quentin  said.  Why  dont  you  feed  him  in  the  kitchen. 
It's  like  eating  with  a  pig. 

If  you  dont  like  the  way  we  eat,  you'd  better  not  come 
to  the  table,  Jason  said. 

Steam  came  off  of  Roskus.  He  was  sitting  in  front  of 
the  stove.  The  oven  door  was  open  and  Roskus  had  his 
feet  in  it.  Steam  came  off  the  bowl.  Caddy  put  the  spoon 
into  my  mouth  easy.  There  was  a  black  spot  on  the  inside 
of  the  bowl. 

Now,  now,  Dilsey  said.  He  aint  going  to  bother  you 
no  more. 

It  got  down  below  the  mark.  Then  the  bowl  was 
empty.  It  went  away.  "He's  hungry  tonight/'  Caddy  said. 
The  bowl  came  back.  I  couldn't  see  the  spot.  Then  I 
could.  "He's  starved,  tonight."  Caddy  said.  "Look  how 
much  he's  eaten." 

Yes  he  will,  Quentin  said.  "You  all  send  him  out  to  spy 
on  me.  I  hate  this  house.  Tm  going  to  run  away. 


9*0  THE     SOXJND     AKD     THE     FURY 

Roskus  said,  "It  going  to  rain  all  night." 

Youve  been  running  a  long  time,  not  to  *ve  got  any 
further  off  than  mealtime,  Jason  said. 

See  if  I  dont,  Quentin  said. 

'Then  I  dont  know  what  I  going  to  do."  Dilsey  said, 
"It  caught  me  in  the  hip  so  bad  now  I  cant  scarcely  move. 
Climbing  them  stairs  all  evening/' 

Ofc,  I  wouldn't  be  surprised,  Jason  said.  I  wouldn't 
fte  surprised  at  anything  you'd  do. 

Quentin  threw  her  napkin  on  the  table. 

Hush  your  mouth,  Jason,  Dilsey  said.  She  went  and 
put  her  arm  around  Quentin.  Sit  down,  honey,  Dilsey 
said.  He  ought  to  be  shamed  of  hisself,  throwing  what 
aint  your  -fault  up  to  you. 

"She  sulling  again,  is  she."  Roskus  said. 

"Hush  your  mouth/'  Dilsey  said. 

Quentin  pushed  Dils^y  away.  She  looked  at  Jason.  Her 
mouth  was  red.  She  picked  up  her  glass  of  water  and 
strung  her  arm  back,  looking  at  Jason.  Dilsey  caught  her 
arm.  They  fought.  The  glass  broke  on  the  table,  and  the 
water  ran  into  the  table.  Quentin  was  running. 

''Mother's  sick  again."  Caddy  said. 

"Sho  she  is."  Dilsey  said.  "Weather  like  this  make 
anybody  sick.  When  you  going  to  get  done  eating,  boy.'* 

Goddamn  you,  Quentin  said.  Goddamn  you.  We  could 
hear  her  running  on  the  stairs.  We  went  to  the  library. 

Caddy  gave  me  the  cushion,  and  I  could  look  at  the 
cushion  and  the  mirror  and  the  fire. 

"We  must  be  quiet  while  Quentin's  studying,"  Father 
said.  "What  are  you  doing,  Jason." 

"Nothing/7  Jason  said. 

"Suppose  you  corne  over  here  to  do  it,  then.'*  Fathe 
said. 

Jason  came  out  of  the  corner. 


SOUKB     AKB     THE     T  TJBY          9\ 

<cWhat  are  you  chewing.**  Father  said* 

"Nothing."  Jason  said. 

"He's  chewing  paper  again."  Caddy  said. 

"Come  here,  Jason."  Father  said. 

Jason  threw  into  the  fire.  It  hissed,  uncurled,  turning 
black.  Then  it  was  gray.  Then  it  was  gone.  Caddy  and 
Father  and  Jason  were  in  Mother's  chair.  Jason's  eyes 
were  puffed  shut  and  his  mouth  moved,  like  tasting. 
Caddy's  head  was  on  Father's  shoulder.  Her  hair  was 
like  fire,  and  little  points  o£  fire  were  in  her  eyes,  and  I 
went  and  Father  lifted  me  into  the  chair  too,  and  Caddy 
held  me.  She  smelled  like  trees, 

She  smelled  like  trees.  In  the  corner  it  was  dark,  but 
1  could  see  the  window.  I  squatted  there,,  holding  the 
slipper.  I  couldn't  see  it,  but  my  hands  saw  it,  and  I  could 
hear  it  getting  night,,  and  my  hands  saw  the  slipper  but 
1  couldnt  see  myself,  but  my  hands  could  see  the  slipper, 
and  I  squatted  there,  hearing  it  getting  dark. 

Here  you  is,  Luster  said.  Look  what  I  got.  He  showed 
it  to  me.  You  know  where  I  got  it.  Miss  Quentin  gave  it 
to  me.  1  knowed  they  couldnt  keep  me  out.  What 
you  doing,  off  in  here.  I  thought  you  don&  slipped  "back 
out  doors.  Aint  you  done  enough  moaning  and  slobbering 
today,  without  hiding  off  in  this  here  empty  room, 
mumbling  and  taking  on.  Come  on  here  to  bed,  so  I  can 
get  up  there  before  it  starts.  I  cant  fool  with  you  all 
night  tonight.  Just  let  them  horns  toot  the  first  toot  and  1 
done  gone. 

We  didn't  go  to  our  room. 

'This  is  where  we  have  the  measles."  Caddy  said. 
**Why  do  we  have  to  sleep  in  here  tonight." 

"What  you  care  where  you  sleep/*  Dilsey  said.  She 
shut  the  door  and  sat  down  and  begian  to  undress  me» 
Jason  began  to  cry.  "Hush."  Dilsey  said. 


$2    THE  SOUND  AND  THE  FUBT 

T  want  to  sleep  with  Damuddy."  Jason  said. 

"She's  sick."  Caddy  said.  "You  can  sleep  with  her  when 
•she  gets  well.  Cant  he,  Dilsey." 

"Hush,  now."  Dilsey  said.  Jason  hushed. 

"Our  nighties  are  here,  and  everything."  Caddy  said. 
"It's  like  moving." 

"And  you  better  get  into  them/'  Dilsey  said.  "You  be 
unbuttoning  Jason." 

Caddy  unbuttoned  Jason.  He  began  to  cry. 

<cYou  want  to  get  whipped."  Dilsey  said.  Jason  hushed. 

Quentin,  Mother  said  in  the  hall. 

What,  Quentin  said  beyond  the  wall,  We  heard  Mother 
lock  the  door.  She  looked  in  our  door  and  came  in  and 
stooped  over  the  bed  and  kissed  me  on  the  forehead. 

When  you  get  him  to  bed,  go  and  ask  Dilsey  if  she 
objects  to  my  having  a  hot  water  bottle,  Mother  said. 
Tell  her  that  if  she  does,  I'll  try  to  get  along  without  it* 
Tell  her  I  just  want  to  know. 

Yessumy  Luster  said.  Come  on.  Get  your  pants  off. 

Quentin  and  Versh  came  in.  Quentin  had  his  face 
turned  away.  "What  are  you  crying  for."  Caddy  said. 

"Hush."  Dilsey  said.  "You  all  get  undressed,  now.  You 
can  go  on  home,  Versh." 

I  got  undressed  and  I  looked  at  myself,  and  I  began 
to  cry.  Hush,  Luster  said.  Looking  for  them  aint  going 
to  do  no  good.  They're  gone.  You  keep  on  like  this,  and 
we  aint  going  have  you  no  more  birthday.  He  put  my 
gown  on.  I  hu-shed,  and  then  Luster  stopped,  his  head 
toward  the  window.  Then  he  went  to  the  window  and 
looked  out.  He  came  back  and  took  my  arm.  Here  she 
come,  he  said.  Be  quiet,  now.  We  went  to  the  window 
and  looked  out.  It  came  out  of  Quentins  window  and 
climbed  across  into  the  tree.  We  watched  the  tree 


THE     SOUND     xiKB     THE     FURY  93 

shaking.  The  shaking  went  down  the  tree,  then  it  came 
out  and  we  watched  it  go  away  across  the  grass.  Then 
we  couldn't  see  it.  Come  on,  Luster  said.  There  now. 
Hear  them  horns.  Itou  get  in  that  bed  while  my  foots 
behaves. 

There  were  two  beds.  Quentin  got  in  the  other  one. 
He  turned  his  face  to  the  wall.  Dilsey  put  Jason  in  with 
him.  Caddy  took  her  dress  off. 

"Just  look  at  your  drawers."  Dilsey  said.  <fiYou  better 
be  glad  your  rna  aint  seen  you." 

"I  already  told  on  her."  Jason  said. 

"I  bound  you  would."  Dilsey  said. 

"And  see  what  you  got  by  it*  Caddy  said.  "Tattletale.'1 

"What  did  I  get  by  it."  Jason  said. 

"Whyn't  you  get  your  nightie  on."  Dilsey  said.  She 
went  and  helped  Caddy  take  off  her  bodice  and  drawers. 
"Just  look  at  you."  Dilsey  said.  She  wadded  the  drawers 
and  scrubbed  Caddy  behind  with  them.  "It  done  soaked 
clean  through  onto  you."  she  said.  "But  you  wont  get  no 
bath  this  night.  Here."  She  put  Caddy's  nightie  on  her 
and  Caddy  climbed  into  the  bed  and  Dilsey  went  to  the 
door  and  stood  with  her  hand  on  the  light.  "You  all  be 
quiet  now,  you  hear."  she  said. 

"All  right."  Caddy  said.  "Mother's  not  coming  in  to- 
night." she  said.  "So  we  still  have  to  mind  me." 

"Yes."  Dilsey  said.  "Go  to  sleep,  now." 

"Mother's  sick."  Caddy  said.  "She  and  Damuddy  are 
both  sick." 

"Hush."  Dilsey  said.  "You  go  to  sleep." 

The  room  went  black,  except  the  door.  Then  the  door 
went  black.  Caddy  said,  "Hush,  Maury ,"  putting  her 
hand  on  me.  So  I  stayed  hushed.  We  could  hear  us.  We 
could  hear  the  dark. 


94     THE   SOUND  AND  THE  PURY 

It  went  away,  and  Father  looked  at  us.  He  looked  at 
Quentin  and  Jason,  then  he  came  and  kissed  Caddy  and 
put  his  hand  on  my  head. 

"Is  Mother  very  sick/*  Caddy  said. 

"No."  Father  said.  "Are  you  going  to  take  good  care  of 
Maury." 

"Yes."  Caddy  said. 

Father  went  to  the  door  and  looked  at  us  again.  Then 
the  dark  came  back,  and  he  stood  black  in  the  door,  and 
then  the  door  turned  black  again.  Caddy  held  me  and  I 
could  hear  us  all,  and  the  darkness,  and  something  I 
could  smell.  And  then  I  could  see  the  windows,  where 
the  trees  were  buzzing.  Then  the  dark  began  to  go  in 
smooth,  bright  shapes,  like  it  always  does,  even  when 
Caddy  says  that  I  have  been  asleep. 


JUNE 

2 

1910 


WHEN  THE  SHADOW  OF  THE  SASH  APPEALED  ON  TJblifi 
curtains  it  was  between  seven  and  eight  oclock 
and  then  I  was  in  time  again,  hearing  the  watch.  It  was 
Grandfather's  and  when  Father  gave  it  to  me  he  said, 
Quentin,  I  give  you  the  mausoleum  of  all  hope  and  de- 
sire; it's  rather  excrutiating-ly  apt  that  you  will  use  it 
to  gain  the  reducto  absurdum  of  all  human  experience 
which  can  fit  your  individual  needs  no  better  than  it 
fitted  his  or  his  father's,  I  give  it  to  you  not  that  you  may 
remember  time,  but  that  you  might  forget  it  now  and 
then  for  a  moment  and  not  spend  all  your  breath  trying 
to  conquer  it.  Because  no  battle  is  ever  won  he  said. 
They  are  not  even  fought.  The  field  only  reveals  to  man 
his  own  folly  and  despair,  and  victory  is  an  illusion  of 
philosophers  and  fools. 

It  was  propped  against  the  collar  box  and  I  lay  listen- 
ing to  it.  Hearing  it,  that  is.  I  dont  suppose  anybody  ever 
deliberately  listens  to  a  watch  or  a  clock.  You  dont  have 
to.  You  can  be  oblivious  to  the  sound  for  a  long  while, 
then  in  a  second  of  ticking  it  can  create  in  the  mind  un- 
broken the  long  diminishing  parade  of  time  you  didn't 

95 


96     THE  SOUND  AND  THE  FURY 

hear.  Like  Father  said  down  the  long  and  lonely  light- 
rays  you  might  see  Jesus  walking,  like.  And  the  good 
Saint  Francis  that  said  Little  Sister  Death,  that  never 
had  a  sister. 

Through  the  wall  I  heard  Shreve's  bed-springs  and 
then  his  slippers  on  the  floor  hishing.  I  got  up  and  went 
to  the  dresser  and  slid  my  hand  along  it  and  touched 
the  watch  and  turned  it  face-down  and  went  back  to 
bed.  But  the  shadow  of  the  sash  was  still  there  and  I 
had  learned  to  tell  almost  "to  the  minute,  so  I'd  have  to 
turn  my  back  to  it,  feeling  the  eyes  animals  used  to  have 
in  the  back  of  their  heads  when  it  was  on  top,  itching. 
It's  always  the  idle  habits  you  acquire  which  you  will 
regret  Father  said  that.  That  Christ  was  not  crucified: 
he  was  worn  away  by  a  minute  clicking  of  little  wheels. 
That  had  no  sister. 

And  so  as  soon  as  I  knew  I  couldn't  see  it,  I  began  to 
wonder  what  time  it  was.  Father  said  that  constant 
speculation  regarding  the  position  of  mechanical  hands 
on  an  arbitrary  dial  which  is  a  symptom  of  mind-func- 
tion. Excrement  Father  said  like  sweating.  And  I  saying 
All  right.  Wonder.  Go  on  and  wonder. 

If  it  had  been  cloudy  I  could  have  looked  at  the  win- 
dow, thinking  what  he  said  about  idle  habits.  Thinking 
it  would  be  nice  for  them  down  at  New  London  if  the 
weather  held  up  like  this.  Why  shouldn't  it?  The  month 
of  brides,  the  voice  that  breathed  She  ran  right  out  of 
the  mirror.,  out  of  the  banked  scent.  Roses.  Roses.  Mr 
and  Mrs  Jason  Richmond  Compson  announce  the  mar- 
riage of.  Roses.  Not  virgins  like  dogwood,  milkweed.  I 
said  I  have  committed  incest,  Father  I  said.  Roses. 
Cunning  and  serene.  If  you  attend  Harvard  one  year, 
but  dont  see  the  boat-race,  there  should  be  a  refund.  Let 
Jason  have  it.  Give  Jason  a  year  at  Harvard. 


THE      SOUISTD      AND     THE     FtJBY  97 

Shreve  stood  in  the  door,  putting  Ms  collar  on,  Ms 
glasses  glinting  rosily,  as  though  he  had  washed  them 
with  his  face.  "You  taking  a  cut  this  morning?" 

"Is  it  that  late?" 

He  looked  at  his  watch.  "Bell  in  two  minutes." 

"I  didn't  know  it  was  that  late."  He  was  still  looking 
at  the  watch,  his  mouth  shaping.  Til  have  to  hustle*  I 
cant  stand  another  cut.  The  dean  told  me  last  week — " 
He  put  the  watch  back  into  his  pocket.  Then  I  quit 
talking. 

"You'd  better  slip  on  your  pants  and  run,"  he  said. 
He  went  out. 

I  got  up  and  moved  about,  listening  to  him  through 
the  wall.  He  entered  the  sitting-room,  toward  the  door. 

"Aren't  you  ready  yet?" 

"Not  yet.  Run  along.  Ill  make  it." 

He  went  out.  The  door  closed.  His  feet  went  down  the 
corridor.  Then  I  could  hear  the  watch  again.  I  quit 
moving  around  and  went  to  the  window  and  drew  the 
curtains  aside  and  watched  them  running  for  chapel, 
the  same  ones  fighting  the  same  heaving  coat-sleeves,  the 
same  books  and  flapping  collars  flushing  past  like  debris 
on  a  flood,  and  Spoade.  Calling  Shreve  my  husband.  Ah 
let  him  alone,  Shreve  said,  if  he's  got  better  sense  than, 
to  chase  after  the  little  dirty  sluts,  whose  business.  In 
the  South  you  are  ashamed  of  being  a  virgin.  Boys.  Men. 
They  lie  about  it.  Because  it  means  less  to  women, 
Father  said.  He  said  it  was  men  invented  virginity  not 
women.  Father  said  it's  like  death:  only  a  state  in  which 
the  others  are  left  and  I  said,  But  to  believe  it  doesn't 
matter  and  he  said,  That's  what's  so  sad  about  anything: 
not  only  virginity,  and  I  said,  Why  couldn't  it  have  been 
me  and  not  her  who  is  unvirgin  and  he  said,  That's  why 
that's  sad  too;  nothing  is  even  worth  the  changing  of  it 


?»  THE     SOITXIJ     AND     THE     FTTBY 

and  Shreve  said  if  he's  got  better  sense  than  to  chase  after 
the  little  dirty  sluts  and  I  said  Did  you  ever  have  a  sis- 
ter? Did  you?  Did  you? 

Spoade  was  in  the  middle  of  them  like  a  terrapin  in  a 
street  full  of  scuttering  dead  leaves,  his  collar  about  his 
ears,  moving  at  his  customary  unhurried  walk.  He  was 
from  South  Carolina,  a  senior.  It  was  his  club's  boast  that 
he  never  ran  for  chapel  and  had  never  got  there  on  time 
and  had  never  been  absent  in  four  years  and  had  never 
made  either  chapel  or  first  lecture  with  a  shirt  on  his 
back  and  socks  on  his  feet.  About  ten  oclock  he'd  come 
in  Thompson's,  get  two  cups  of  coffee,  sit  down  and  take 
his  socks  out  of  his  pocket  and  remove  his  shoes  and  put 
them  on  while  the  coffee  cooled.  About  noon  you'd  see 
him  with  a  shirt  and  collar  on,  Hke  anybody  else.  The 
others  passed  him  running,  but  he  never  increased  his 
pace  at  all.  After  a  while  the  quad  was  empty. 

A  sparrow  slanted  across  the  sunlight,  onto  the  window 
ledge,  and  cocked  his  head  at  me.  His  eye  was  round 
and  bright.  First  he'd  watch  me  with  one  eye,  then  flick! 
and  it  would  be  the  other  one,  his  throat  pumping  faster 
than  any  pulse.  The  hour  began  to  strike.  The  sparrow 
quit  swapping  eyes  and  watched  me  steadily  Math  the 
same  one  until  the  chimes  ceased,  as  if  he  were  listening 
too.  Then  he  flicked  off  the  ledge  and  was  gone. 

It  was  a  while  before  the  last  stroke  ceased  vibrating. 
It  stayed  in  the  air,  more  felt  than  heard,  for  a  long  time. 
Like  all  the  bells  that  ever  rang  still  ringing  in  the  long 
dying  light-rays  and  Jesus  and  Saint  Francis  talking 
about  his  sister.  Because  if  it  were  just  to  hell;  if  that 
were  all  of  it.  Finished.  If  things  just  finished  themselves. 
Nobody  else  there  but  her  and  me.  If  we  could  just  have 
done  something  so  dreadful  that  they  would  have  fled 
hell  except  us.  I  haw  committed  incest  I  said  Father  it 


tfO  XT  38-33      AND     MrrsCE      FTJItV  ?J 

was  I  it  was  not  Dalton  Ames  And  when  lie  put  Dalton 
Ames.  Dalton  Ames.  Dalton  Ames.  When  lie  put  the 
pistol  in  my  hand  I  didn't.  That's  why  I  didn't.  He  would 
be  there  and  she  would  and  I  would.  Dalton  Ames.  Dal- 
ton Ames.  Dalton  Ames.  If  we  could  have  just  done  some- 
tiling  so  dreadful  and  Father  said  That's  sad  too,  people 
cannot  do  anything  that  dreadful  they  cannot  do  any- 
thing very  dreadful  at  all  they  cannot  even  remember  to- 
morrow what  seemed  dreadful  today  and  I  said,  You  can 
shirk  all  things  and  he  said,  Ah  can  you.  And  I  will  look 
down  and  see  my  murmuring  bones  and  the  deep  water 
like  wind,  like  a  roof  of  wind,  and  after  a  long  time  they 
cannot  distinguish  even  bones  upon  the  lonely  and  invio- 
late sand.  Until  on  the  Day  when  He  says  Rise  only  the 
flatiron  would  come  floating  up.  It's  not  when  you  realise 
that  nothing  can  help  you — religion,  pride,  anything — 
it's  when  you  realise  that  you  dont  need  any  aid.  Dalton 
Ames.  Dalton  Ames,  Dalton  Ames.  If  I  could  have  been 
his  mother  lying  with  open  body  lifted  laughing,  holding 
his  father  with  my  hand  refraining,  seeing,  watching  him 
die  before  he  lived.  One  minute  she  was  standing  in  the 
door 

I  went  to  the  dresser  and  took  up  the  watch,  with  the 
face  still  down.  I  tapped  the  crystal  on  the  corner  of  the 
dresser  and  caught  the  fragments  of  glass  in  my  hand 
and  put  them  into  the  ashtray  and  twisted  the  hands  off 
and  put  them  in  the  tray.  The  watch  ticked  on.  I  turned 
the  face  up,  the  blank  dial  with  little  wheels  clicking  and 
clicking  behind  it,  not  knowing  any  better.  Jesus  walking 
on  Galilee  and  Washington  not  telling  lies.  Father 
brought  back  a  watch-charm  from  the  Saint  Louis  Fair 
to  Jason:  a  tiny  opera  glass  into  which  you  squinted  with 
one  eye  and  saw  a  skyscraper,  a  ferris  wheel  all  spideiy, 
Niagara  Falls  on  a  pinhead.  There  was  a  red  smear  on 


100        THE     SOUKD     AND     TB.E 


the  dial.  When  I  saw  it  my  thumb  began  to  smart.  I  put 
the  watch  down  and  went  into  Shreve's  room  ?  ad  got  the 
iodine  and  painted  the  cut.  I  cleaned  the  rest  of  the  glass 
out  of  the  rim  with  the  towel. 

I  laid  out  two  suits  of  underwear,  with  socks,  shirts, 
collars  and  ties,  and  packed  my  trunk.  I  put  in  every- 
thing except  my  new  suit  and  an  old  one  and  two  pairs 
of  shoes  and  two  hats,  and  my  books.  I  carried  the  books 
into  the  sitting-room  and  stacked  them  on  the  table,  the 
ones  I  had  brought  from  home  and  the  ones  Father  said 
it  used  to  be  a  gentleman  was  "known  by  his  books;  now- 
adays he  is  known  by  the  ones  he  has  not  returned  and 
locked  the  trunk  and  addressed  it.  The  quarter  hour 
sounded.  I  stopped  and  listened  to  it  until  the  chimes 
ceased. 

I  bathed  and  shaved.  The  water  made  my  finger  smart 
a  little,  so  I  painted  it  again.  I  put  on  my  new  suit  and 
put  my  watch  on  and  packed  the  other  suit  and  the  ac- 
cessories and  my  razor  and  brushes  in  my  hand  bag,  and 
wrapped  the  trunk  key  into  a  sheet  of  paper  and  put  it 
in  an  envelope  and  addressed  it  to  Father,  and  wrote  the 
two  notes  and  sealed  them. 

The  shadow  hadn't  quite  cleared  the  stoop.  I  stopped 
inside  the  door,  watching  the  shadow  move.  It  moved  al- 
most perceptibly,  creeping  back  inside  the  door,  driving 
the  shadow  back  into  the  door.  Only  she  was  running  al- 
ready when  I  heard  it.  In  the  mirror  she  was  running  be- 
fore I  knew  what  it  was,  That  quick,  her  train  caught  up 
over  her  arm  she  ran  out  of  the  mirror  like  a  cloud,  her 
veil  swirling  in  long  glints  her  heels  brittle  and  fast 
clutching  her  dress  onto  her  shoulder  with  the  other 
hand3  running  out  of  the  mirror  the  smells  roses  roses  the 
voice  that  breathed  o'er  Eden.  Then  she  was  across  the 
porch  I  couldn't  hear  her  heels  then  in  the  moonlight 


THE      SOUXB      AND      THE      FURY         IO1 

like  a  cloud,  the  floating  shadow  of  the  veil  running 
across  th&^rass,  into  the  bellowing.  She  ran  out  of  her 
dress,  clutching  her  bridal,  running  into  the  bellowing 
where  T.  P.  in  the  dew  Whooey  Sassprilluh  Benjy  under 
the  box  bellowing.  Father  had  a  V-shaped  silver  cuirass 
on  his  running  chest 

Shreve  said,  'Well,  you  didn't.  .  *  .  Is  it  a  wedding  or 
a  wake?" 

"I  couldn't  make  it/'  I  said. 

"Not  with  all  that  primping.  What's  the  matter?  You 
think  this  was  Sunday?" 

"I  reckon  the  police  wont  get  me  for  wearing  my  new 
suit  one  time/'  I  said. 

"I  was  thinking  about  the  Square  students.  Have  you 
got  too  proud  to  attend  classes  too?" 

cTm  going  to  eat  first."  The  shadow  on  the  stoop  was 
gone.  I  stepped  into  sunlight,  finding  my  shadow  again. 
I  walked  down  the  steps  just  ahead  of  it.  The  half  hour 
went.  Then  the  chimes  ceased  and  died  away. 

Deacon  wasn't  at  the  postoffice  either.  I  stamped  the 
two  envelopes  and  mailed  the  one  to  Father  and  put 
Shreve's  in  my  inside  pocket,  and  then  I  remembered 
where  I  had  last  seen  the  Deacon.  It  was  on  Decoration 
Day,  in  a  G.  A.  R.  uniform,  in  the  middle  of  the  parade. 
If  you  waited  long  enough  on  any  corner  you  would 
see  him  in  whatever  parade  came  along.  The  one  before 
was  on  Columbus'  or  Garibaldi's  or  somebody's  birthday. 
He  was  in  the  Street  Sweeper's  section,  in  a  stovepipe 
hat,  carrying  a  two  inch  Italian  flag,  smoking  a  cigar 
among  the  brooms  and  scoops.  But  the  last  time  was  the 
G.  A.  R.  one,  because  Shreve  said; 

"There  now.  Just  look  at  what  your  grandpa  did  to 
that  poor  old  nigger." 

"Yes,"  I  said,  "Now  he  can  spend  day  after  day  march- 


10-2         THJE     SOUND     AND      THE     FUB1T 

ing  in  parades.  If  it  hadn't  been  for  my  grandfather,  he'd 
have  to  work  like  whitefolks." 

1  didn't  see  him  anywhere.  But  I  never  knew  even  a 
working  nigger  that  you  could  find  when  you  wanted 
him,  let  alone  one  that  lived  off  the  fat  of  the  land.  A  car 
came  along.  I  went  over  to  town  and  went  to  Parker's 
and  had  a  good  breakfast.  While  I  was  eating  I  heard  a 
clock  strike  the  hour.  But  then  I  suppose  it  takes  at  least 
ane  hour  to  lose  time  in,  who  has  been  longer  than  his- 
tory getting  into  the  mechanical  progression  of  it. 

When  I  finished  breakfast  I  bought  a  cigar.  The  girl 
b-aid  a  fifty  cent  one  was  the  best,  so  I  took  one  and  lit  it 
and  went  out  to  the  street.  I  stood  there  and  took  a  cou- 
ple of  puffs,  then  I  held  it  in  my  hand  and  went  on  to- 
ward the  corner.  I  passed  a  jeweller's  window,  but  I 
looked  away  in  time.  At  the  corner  two  bootblacks 
taught  me,  one  on  either  side,  shrill  and  raucous,  like 
blackbirds.  I  gave  the  cigar  to  one  of  them,  and  the  other 
erne  a  nickel.  Then  they  let  me  alone.  The  one  with  the 
cigar  was  trying  to  sell  it  to  the  other  for  the  nickel. 

There  was  a  clock,  high  up  in  the  sun,  and  I  thought 
about  how,  when  you  dont  want  to  do  a  thing,  your 
body  will  try  to  trick  you  into  doing  it,  sort  of  unawares. 
I  could  feel  the  muscles  in  the  back  of  my  neck,  and 
then  I  could  hear  my  watch  ticking  away  in  my  pocket 
and  after  a  while  I  had  all  the  other  sounds  shut  away, 
leaving  only  the  watch  in  my  pocket.  I  turned  back  up 
the  street,  to  the  window.  He  was  working  at  the  table 
behind  the  window.  He  was  going  bald.  There  was  a 
glass  in  his  eye — a  metal  tube  screwed  into  his  face.  I 
went  in. 

The  place  was  full  of  ticking,  like  crickets  in  September 
grass,  and  I  could  hear  a  big  clock  on  the  wall  above  his 
head.  He  looked  ap,  his  eye  big  and  blurred  and  rushing 


THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FUBY        103 

beyond  the  glass.  I  took  mine  out  and  handed  ft  to  him. 

"I  broke  my  watch." 

He  flipped  it  over  in  his  hand.  "I  should  say  you  have 
You  must  have  stepped  on  it/' 

"Yes,  sir.  I  knocked  it  off  the  dresser  and  stepped  on  it 
in  the  dark.  It's  still  running  though." 

He  pried  the  back  open  and  squinted  into  it.  "Seems 
to  be  all  right.  I  cant  tell  until  I  go  over  it,  though.  I'll 
go  into  it  this  afternoon." 

'Til  bring  it  back  later,"  I  said.  "Would  you  mind  tell- 
ing me  if  any  of  those  watches  in  the  window  are  right?** 

He  held  niy  watch  on  his  palm  and  looked  up  at  me 
with  his  blurred  rushing  eye. 

"I  made  a  bet  with  a  f ellow,"  I  said,  "And  I  forgot  my 
glasses  this  morning/' 

'Why,  all  right,"  he  said.  He  laid  the  watch  down  and 
half  rose  on  his  stool  and  looked  over  the  barrier.  Then 
he  glanced  up  at  the  wall.  "It's  twen — " 

"Dont  tell  me,"  I  said,  "please  sir.  Just  tell  me  if  any  oi 
them  are  right." 

He  looked  at  me  again.  He  sat  back  on  the  stool  and 
pushed  the  glass  up  onto  his  forehead.  It  left  a  red  circle 
around  his  eye  and  when  it  was  gone  his  whole  face 
looked  naked.  "What're  you  celebrating  today?"  he  said* 
"That  boat  race  aint  until  next  week,  is  it?" 

"No,  sir.  This  is  just  a  private  celebration.  Birthday. 
Are  any  of  them  right?" 

"No.  But  they  haven't  been  regulated  and  set  yet.  H 
you're  thinking  of  buying  one  of  them — ** 

"No,  sir.  I  dont  need  a  watch.  We  have  a  clock  in  our 
sitting  room.  I'll  have  this  one  fixed  when  I  do/*  I 
reached  my  hand. 

"Better  leave  it  now/' 

"111  bring  it  back  later."  He  gave  me  the  watch.  I  put 


104        THE     SOUSTD     AND     THE     FURY 

it  in  my  pocket  I  couldn't  hear  it  now,  above  all  the 
others.  "I'm  much  obliged  to  you.  I  hope  I  haven't  taken 
up  your  time." 

"That's  all  right.  Bring  it  in  when  you  are  ready.  And 
you  better  put  off  this  celebration  until  after  we  win  that 
boat  race." 

<cYes,  sir.  I  reckon  I  had." 

I  went  out,  shutting  the  door  upon  the  ticking.  I  looked 
back  into  the  window.  He  was  watching  me  across  the 
barrier.  There  were  about  a  dozen  watches  in  the  win- 
dow, a  dozen  different  hours  and  each  with  the  same  as- 
sertive and  contradictory  assurance  that  mine  had,  with- 
out any  hands  at  all.  Contradicting  one  another.  1  could 
hear  mine,  ticking  away  inside  my  pocket,  even  though 
nobody  could  see  it,  even  though  it  could  tell  nothing  if 
anyone  could. 

And  so  I  told  myself  to  take  that  one.  Because  Father 
said  clocks  slay  time.  He  said  time  is  dead  as  long  as  it  is 
being  clicked  off  by  little  wheels;  only  when  the  clock 
stops  does  time  come  to  life.  The  hands  were  extended, 
slightly  off  the  horizontal  at  a  faint  angle,  like  a  gull 
tilting  into  the  wind.  Holding  all  I  used  to  be  sorry  about 
like  the  new  moon  holding  water,  niggers  say.  The  jew- 
eller was  working  again,  bent  over  his  bench,  the  tube 
tunnelled  into  his  face.  His  hair  was  parted  in  the  center. 
The  part  ran  up  into  the  bald  spot,  like  a  drained  marsh 
in  December. 

I  saw  the  hardware  store  from  across  the  street.  I  didn't 
know  you  bought  flat-irons  by  the  pound. 

The  clerk  said,  "These  weigh  ten  pounds."  Only  they 
were  bigger  than  I  thought.  So  I  got  two  six-pound  little 
ones,  because  they  would  look  like  a  pair  of  shoes 
wrapped  up.  They  felt  heavy  enough  together,  but  I 


THE     SOUND     AND     THE     PtJEY        IOJ 

thought  again  how  Father  had  said  about  the  reducto  ab- 
surdum  of  human  experience,  thinking  how  the  only  op- 
portunity I  seemed  to  have  for  the  application  of  Har- 
vard. Maybe  by  next  year;  thinking  maybe  it  takes  two 
years  in  school  to  learn  to  do  that  properly, 

But  they  felt  heavy  enough  in  the  air.  A  street  car 
came.  I  got  on.  I  didn't  see  the  placard  on  the  front  It 
was  full,  mostly  prosperous  looking  people  reading  news- 
papers. The  only  vacant  seat  was  beside  a  nigger.  He 
wore  a  derby  and  shined  shoes  and  he  was  holding  a 
dead  cigar  stub.  I  used  to  think  that  a  Southerner  had  to 
be  always  conscious  of  niggers.  I  thought  that  Northern- 
ers would  expect  him  to.  When  I  first  came  East  I  kept 
thinking  YouVe  got  to  remember  to  think  of  them  as  col- 
oured people  not  niggers,  and  if  it  hadn*t  happened 
that  I  wasn't  thrown  with  many  of  them,  I'd  have  wasted 
a  lot  of  time  and  trouble  before  I  learned  that  the  best 
way  to  take  all  people,  black  or  white,  is  to  take  them  for 
what  they  think  they  are,  then  leave  them  alone.  That 
was  when  I  realised  that  a  nigger  is  not  a  person  so  much 
as  a  form  of  behaviour;  a  sort  of  obverse  reflection  of  the 
white  people  he  lives  among.  But  I  thought  at  first  that 
I  ought  to  miss  having  a  lot  of  them  around  me  because 
i  thought  that  Northerners  thought  I  did,  but  I  didn't 
know  that  I  really  had  missed  Roslcus  and  Dilsey  and 
them  until  that  morning  in  Virginia.  The  train  was 
"topped  when  I  waked  and  I  raised  the  shade  and  looked 
out.  The  car  was  blocking  a  *oad  crossing>  where  two 
white  fences  came  down  a  hill  and  then  sprayed  outward 
and  downward  like  part  of  the  skeleton  of  a  horn,  and 
there  was  a  nigger  on  a  mule  in  the  middle  of  the  stifi 
ruts,  waiting  for  the  train  to  move.  How  long  he  had 
been  there  I  didn't  know,  but  ke  sat  straddle  of  the  rmile* 


106        THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FUBY 

his  head  wrapped  in  a  piece  of  blanket,  as  if  they  had 
been  built  there  with  the  fence  and  the  road,  or  with  the 
hill,  carved  out  of  the  hill  itself,  like  a  sign  put  there  say- 
ing You  are  home  again.  He  didn't  have  a  saddle  and  his 
feet  dangled  almost  to  the  ground.  The  mule  looked  like 
a  rabbit.  I  raised  the  window. 

"Hey,  Uncle/'  1  said,  "Is  this  the  way?" 

"Suh?"  He  looked  at  me,  then  he  loosened  the  blanket 
and  lifted  it  away  from  his  ear. 

"Christmas  gift!"  I  said. 

"Sho  comin,  boss.  You  done  caught  me,  aint  you?" 

"I'll  let  you  off  this  time."  I  dragged  my  pants  out  of 
the  little  hammock  and  got  a  quarter  out.  "But  look  out 
next  time.  Ill  be  coming  back  through  here  two  days 
after  New  Year,  and  look  out  then."  I  threw  the  quarter 
out  the  window.  "Buy  yourself  some  Santy  Glaus." 

"Yes,  suh,"  he  said.  He  got  down  and  picked  up  the 
quarter  and  rubbed  it  on  his  leg.  "Thanky,  young  mar- 
ster.  Thanky."  Then  the  train  began  to  move.  I  leaned 
out  the  window,  into  the  cold  air,  looking  back.  He  stood 
there  beside  the  gaunt  rabbit  of  a  mule,  the  two  of  them 
shabby  and  motionless  and  unimpatient.  The  train 
swung  around  the  curve,  the  engine  puffing  with  short, 
heavy  blasts,  and  they  passed  smoothly  from  sight  that 
way,  with  tha*:  quality  about  them  of  shabby  and  time- 
less patience,  of  static  serenity:  that  blending  of  childlike 
and  ready  incompetence  and  paradoxical  reliability  that 
tends  and  protects  them  it  loves  out  of  all  reason  and 
robs  them  steadily  and  evades  responsibility  and  obliga- 
tions by  means  too  barefaced  to  be  called  subterfuge 
even  and  is  taken  in  theft  or  evasion  with  only  that  frank 
and  spontaneous  admiration  for  the  victor  which  a  gentle- 
man feels  for  anyone  who  beats  him  in  a  fair  contest, 


THE     SOUKB     A1STD     THE  " 

and  withal  a  fond  and  unflagging  tolerance  for  white- 
folks'  vagaries  like  that  of  a  grandparent  for  unpredict- 
able and  troublesome  children,  which  I  had  forgotten. 
And  all  that  day,  while  the  train  wound  through  rushing 
gaps  and  along  ledges  where  movement  was  only  a  la- 
bouring sound  of  the  exhaust  and  groaning  wheels  and 
the  eternal  mountains  stood  fading  into  the  thick  sky, 
I  thought  of  home,  of  the  bleak  station  and  the  mud  and 
the  niggers  and  country  folks  thronging  slowly  about  the 
square,  with  toy  monkeys  and  wagons  and  candy  in  sacks 
and  roman  candles  sticking  out,  and  my  insides  would 
move  like  they  used  to  do  in  school  when  the  bell  rang. 
I  wouldn't  begin  counting  until  the  clock  struck  three. 
Then  I  would  begin,  counting  to  sixty  and  folding  down 
one  finger  and  thinking  of  the  other  fourteen  fingers  wait* 
ing  to  be  folded  down,  or  thirteen  or  twelve  or  eight  or 
seven,  until  all  of  a  sudden  I'd  realise  silence  and  the 
unwinking  minds,  and  I'd  say  "Ma'ain?"  "Your  name  is 
Quentin,  isn't  it?"  Miss  Laura  said.  Then  more  silence  and 
the  cruel  unwinking  minds  and  hands  jerking  into  the 
silence.  "Tell  Quentin  who  discovered  the  Mississippi 
River,   Henry."  "DeSoto."  Then  the  minds  would   go 
away,  and  after  a  while  I'd  be  afraid  I  had  gotten  be- 
hind and  I'd  count  fast  and  fold  down  another  fingera 
then  I'd  be  afraid  I  was  going  too  fast  and  I'd  slow  up, 
then  I'd  get  afraid  and  count  fast  again.  So  I  never  could 
come  out  even  with  the  bell,  and  the  released  surging  oi 
feet  moving  already,  feeling  earth  in  the  scuffed  floor, 
and  the  day  like  a  pane  of  glass  struck  a  light,  sharp 
blow,  and  my  insides  would  move,  sitting  still.  Moving 
sitting  still.  One  minute  she  was  standing  in  the  door. 
Benjy.  Bellowing.  Benjamin  the  child  of  mine  old  age 
bellowing.  Caddy!  Caddy! 


108         THE      SOUND     AND     THE     PCTBY 

Tm  going  to  run  away.  He  began  to  cry  she  went 
touched  him.  Hush.  Tm  not  going  to.  Hush.  He  hushed. 
Dilsetj. 

He  smell  what  you  tell  him  when  he  want  to.  Dont 
have  to  listen  nor  talk. 

Can  he  smell  that  new  name  they  give  him?  Can  he 
smell  bad  luck? 

What  he  want  to  worry  about  luck  for?  Luck  cant  do 
him  no  hurt. 

What  they  change  his  name  for  then  if  aint  trying  to 
help  his  luck? 

The  street  car  stopped,  started,  stopped  again.  Below 
the  window  I  watched  the  crowns  of  people's  heads  pass- 
ing beneath  new  straw  hats  not  yet  unbleached.  There 
were  women  in  the  car  now,  with  market  baskets,  and 
men  in  work-clothes  were  beginning  to  outnumber  the 
shined  shoes  and  collars. 

The  nigger  touched  my  knee.  "Pardon  me/*  he  said.  I 
swung  my  legs  out  and  let  him  pass.  We  were  going  be- 
side a  blank  wall,  the  sound  clattering  back  into  the  car, 
at  the  women  with  market  baskets  on  their  knees  and  a 
man  in  a  stained  hat  with  a  pipe  stuck  in  the  band.  I 
could  smell  water,  and  in  a  break  in  the  wall  I  saw  a 
glint  of  water  and  two  masts,  and  a  gull  motionless  in 
midair,  like  on  an  invisible  wire  between  the  masts,  and 
I  raised  my  hand  and  through  my  coat  touched  the  letters 
I  had  written.  When  the  car  stopped  I  got  off. 

The  bridge  was  open  to  let  a  schooner  through.  She 
was  in  tow,  the  tug  nudging  along  under  her  quarter, 
trailing  smoke,  but  the  ship  herself  was  like  she  was  mov- 
ing without  visible  means.  A  man  naked  to  the  waist  was 
coiling  down  a  line  on  the  fo'c's'le  head.  His  body  was 
burned  the  colour  of  leaf  tobacco.  Another  man  in  a 
straw  hat  without  any  crown  was  at  the  wheel.  The  ship 


THE     SOUND     AKB     THE     IFUBT 

went  through  the  bridge,  moving  under  bare  poles  like  a 
ghost  in  broad  day,  with  three  gulls  hovering  above  the 
stern  like  toys  on  invisible  wires. 

When  it  closed  I  crossed  to  the  other  side  and  leaned 
on  the  rail  above  the  boathouses.  The  float  was  empty 
and  the  doors  were  closed.  The  crew  just  pulled  in  the 
late  afternoon  now,  resting  up  before.  The  shadow 
of  the  bridge,  the  tiers  of  railing,  my  shadow  leaning  flat 
upon  the  water,  so  easily  had  I  tricked  it  that  it  would  not 
quit  me.  At  least  fifty  feet  it  was,  and  if  I  only  had  some- 
tiling  to  blot  it  into  the  water,  holding  it  until  it  was 
drowned,  the  shadow  of  the  package  like  two  shoes 
wrapped  up  lying  on  the  water.  Niggers  say  a  drowned 
man's  shadow  was  watching  for  him  in  the  water  all  the 
time.  It  twinkled  and  glinted,  like  breathing,  the  float 
slow  like  breathing  too,  and  debris  half  submerged,  heal- 
ing out  to  the  sea  and  the  caverns  and  the  grottoes  of 
the  sea.  The  displacement  of  water  is  equal  to  the  some- 
thing of  something.  Reducto  absurdum  of  all  human  ex- 
perience, and  two  six-pound  flat-irons  weigh  more  than 
one  tailor's  goose.  What  a  sinful  waste  Dilsey  would  say. 
Benjy  knew  it  when  Damuddy  died.  He  cried.  He  smell 
hit.  He  smell  hit. 

The  tug  came  back  downstream,  the  water  shearing  in 
long  rolling  cylinders,  rocking  the  float  at  last  with  the 
echo  of  passage,  the  float  lurching  onto  the  rolling  cylin- 
der with  a  plopping  sound  and  a  long  jarring  noise  as  the 
door  rolled  back  and  two  men  emerged,  carrying  a  shell. 
They  set  it  in  the  water  and  a  moment  later  Bland  came 
out,  with  the  sculls.  He  wore  flannels,  a  grey  jacket  and  a 
stiff  straw  hat.  Either  he  or  his  mother  had  read  some- 
where that  Oxford  students  pulled  in  flannels  and  stiff 
hats,  so  early  one  March  they  bought  Gerald  a  one  pair 
shell  and  in  his  flannels  and  stiff  hat  he  went  on  the  river. 


110        THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FXJH.Y 

The  folks  at  the  boathouses  threatened  to  call  a  police- 
man, but  he  went  anyway.  His  mother  came  down  in  a 
hired  auto,  in  a  fur  suit  like  an  arctic  explorer's,  and  saw 
him  off  in  a  twenty-five  mile  wind  and  a  steady  drove  of 
ice  floes  like  dirty  sheep.  Ever  since  then  I  have  be- 
lieved that  God  is  not  only  a  gentleman  and  a  sport;  He 
is  a  Kentuckian  too.  When  he  sailed  away  she  made  a 
detour  and  came  down  to  the  river  again  and  drove 
along  parallel  with  him,  the  car  in  low  gear.  They  said 
you  couldn't  have  told  they'd  ever  seen  one  another  be- 
fore, like  a  King  and  Queen,  not  even  looking  at  one  an- 
other, just  moving  side  by  side  across  Massachusetts  on 
parahel  courses  like  a  couple  of  planets. 

He  got  in  and  pulled  away.  He  pulled  pretty  well  now. 
He  ought  to.  They  said  his  mother  tried  to  make  him 
give  rowing  up  and  do  something  else  the  rest  of  his  class 
couldn't  or  wouldn't  do,  but  for  once  he  was  stubborn. 
If  you  could  call  it  stubbornness,  sitting  in  his  attitudes 
of  princely  boredom,  with  his  curly  yellow  hair  and  his 
violet  eyes  and  his  eyelashes  and  his  New  Fork  clothes, 
while  his  mamma  was  telling  us  about  Gerald's  horses 
and  Gerald's  niggers  and  Gerald's  women.  Husbands  and 
fathers  in  Kentucky  must  have  been  awful  glad  when  she 
carried  Gerald  off  to  Cambridge.  She  had  an  apartment 
over  in  town,  and  Gerald  had  one  there  too,  besides  his 
rooms  in  college.  She  approved  of  Gerald  associating 
with  me  because  I  at  least  revealed  a  blundering  sense  of 
noblesse  oblige  by  getting  myself  born  below  Mason  anA 
Dixon,  and  a  few  others  whose  geography  met  the  re- 
quirements (minimum)  Forgave,  at  least  Or  condoned. 
But  since  she  met  Spoade  coming  out  of  chapel  one  lie 
said  she  couldn't  be  a  lady  no  lady  would  be  out  at  that 
hour  of  the  night  she  never  had  been  able  to  forgive  him 
for  having  five  names,  including  that  of  a  present  Eng- 


THE     SCUKO     AND     THE     FTTBY         III 

itsh  ducal  house.  I'm  sure  site  solaced  herself  by  being 
Convinced  that  some  misfit  Maingault  or  Mortemar  had 
>ot  mixed  up  with  the  lodge-keeper's  daughter.  WhicL 
r/as  quite  probable,  whether  she  invented  it  or  not 
Spoade  was  the  world's  champion  sitter-a-round,  no 
holds  barred  and  gouging  discretionary. 

The  shell  was  a  speck  now,  the  oars  catching  the  SUQ 
in  spaced  glints,  as  if  the  hull  were  winking  itself  along, 
Did  you  ever  have  a  sister?  No  but  they're  all  bitches. 
Did  you  ever  have  a  sister?  One  minute  she  was.  Bitches. 
Not  bitch  one  minute  she  stood  in  the  door  Dalton  Ames. 
Dalton  Ames.  Dalton  Shirts.  I  thought  all  the  time  they 
were  khaki,  army  issue  khaki,  until  I  saw  they  were  of 
heavy  Chinese  silk  or  finest  flannel  because  they  made  his 
face  so  brown  his  eyes  so  blue.  Dalton  Ames.  It  just 
missed  gentility.  Theatrical  fixture.  Just  papier-mache, 
then  touch.  Oh.  Asbestos.  Not  quite  bronze.  But  wont  see 
him  at  the  house. 

Caddy's  a  woman  too,  remember.  She  must  do  things 
for  women\s  reasons,  too. 

Why  wont  you  bring  him  to  the  house.,  Caddy?  Why 
must  you  do  like  nigger  women  do  in  the  pasture  the 
ditches  the  dark  woods  hot  hidden  furious  in  -the  dark 
'.voods. 

And  after  a  while  I  had  been  hearing  my  watch  for 
some  time  and  I  could  feel  the  letters  crackle  through  my 
coat,  against  the  railing,  and  I  leaned  on  the  railing, 
watching  my  shadow,  how  I  had  tricked  it.  I  moved 
along  the  rail,  but  my  suit  was  dark  too  and  I  could 
wipe  my  hands,  watching  my  shadow,  how  I  had  tricked 
it.  I  walked  it  into  the  shadow  of  the  quaL  Then  I  went 
east. 

Harvard  my  Harvard  boy  Harvard  harvard  That  pim- 
ple-faced infant  she  met  at  the  field-meet  with  coloured 


112        THE     SOUND     AHB     THE     FURY 

ribbons.  Skulking  along  the  fence  trying  to  whistle  her 
But  like  a  puppy.  Because  they  couldn't  cajole  him  into 
the  diningroom  Mother  believed  he  had  some  sort  of  spell 
he  was  going  to  cast  on  her  when  he  got  her  alone.  Yet 
any  blackguard  He  was  lying  beside  the  box  under  the 
window  bellowing  that  could  drive  up  in  a  limousine 
With  a  flower  in  his  buttonhole.  Harvard.  Quentin  this 
is  Herbert.  My  Harvard  boy.  Herbert  will  be  a  big 
brother  has  already  promised  Jason  a  position  in  the 
bank. 

Hearty,  celluloid  like  a  drummer.  Face  full  of  teeth 
white  but  not  smiling.  Tve  heard  of  him  up  there.  All 
teeth  but  not  smiling.  You  going  to  drive? 

Get  in  Quentin. 

"You  going  to  drive. 

Ifs  her  car  arent  you  proud  of  your  little  sister  owns 
first  auto  in  town  Herbert  his  present.  Louis  has  been 
giving  her  lessons  every  morning  didrit  you  get  my  let- 
ter Mr  and  Mrs  Jason  Richmond  Compson  announce  the 
marriage  of  their  daughter  Candace  to  Mr  Sydney  Her- 
bert Head  on  the  twenty-fifth  of  April  one  thousand  nine 
hundred  and  ten  at  Jefferson  Mississippi.  At  home  after 
the  first  of  August  number  Something  Something  Avenue 
South  Bend  Indiana.  Shreve  said  Aren't  you  even  going 
to  open  it?  Three  days.  Times.  Mr  and  Mrs  Jason  Rich- 
mond  Compson  Young  Lochinvar  rode  out  of  the  west  a 
little  too  soon,  didn't  he? 

I'm  from  the  south.  You're  funny,  aren't  you, 

0  yes  I  knew  it  was  somewhere  in  the  country. 
You're  funny,  aren't  you.  You  ought  to  join  the  circus* 

1  did.  That's  how  I  ruined  my  eyes  watering  the  ele- 
phant's fleas.  Three  times  These  country  girls.  You  cant 
even  tell  about  them,  can  you.  Well,  anyway  Byron  never 


THK     SOUND     AND     THE     FURY 

had  his  wish,  thank  God.  But  not  hit  a  man  in  glasses. 
Aren't  you  even  going  to  open  it?  It  lay  on  the  table  a 
candle  burning  at  each  comer  upon  the  envelope  tied  in 
a  soiled  pink  garter  two  artificial  flowers.  Not  hit  a  man 
in  glasses. 

Country  people  poor  things  they  never  saw  an  auto  be- 
fore lots  of  them  honk  the  horn  Candace  so  She  wouldni 
look  at  me  they'll  get  out  of  the  way  wouldn't  look  at  me 
your  father  wouldn't  like  it  if  you  were  to  injure  one  of 
them  I'll  declare  your  father  will  simply  have  to  get  au 
auto  now  I'm  almost  sorry  you  brought  it  down  Herbert 
I've  enjoyed  it  so  much  of  course  there's  the  carriage  but 
so  often  when  I'd  like  to  go  out  Mr  Compson  has  the 
darkies  doing  something  it  would  be  worth  my  head  to 
interrupt  he  insists  that  Roskus  is  at  my  call  all  the  time 
but  I  know  what  that  means  I  know  how  often  people 
make  promises  just  to  satisfy  their  consciences  are  you 
going  to  treat  my  little  baby  girl  that  way  Herbert  but  I 
know  you  wont  Herbert  has  spoiled  us  all  to  death  Quen- 
tin  did  I  write  you  that  he  is  going  to  take  Jason  into  his 
bank  when  Jason  finishes  high  school  Jason  wilt  make  a 
splendid  banker  he  is  the  only  one  of  my  children  with 
any  practical  sense  you  can  thank  me  for  that  he  takes 
after  my  people  the  others  are  all  Compson  Jason  fur~ 
nished  the  flour.  They  made  kites  on  the  back  porch  and 
sold  them  -for  a  nickel  a  piece.,  he  and  the  Patterson  boy. 
Jason  was  treasurer. 

There  was  no  nigger  in  this  street  car,  and  the  hats 
unbleached  as  yet  flowing  past  under  the  window.  Going 
to  Harvard.  We  have  sold  Benjy's  He  lay  on  the  ground 
under  the  window,  bellowing.  We  have  sold  Benjys  pas* 
ture  so  that  Quentin  may  go  to  Harvard  a  brother  to  you* 
Your  little  brother. 


THE     SOUKB     AND     THE     FUBT 

You  should  have  a  car  it's  done  you  no  end  of  good 
dont  you  think  so  Quentin  I  call  him  Quentin  at  once  you 
see  I  have  heard  so  much  about  him  from  Candace. 

Why  shouldn't  you  I  want  nay  boys  to  be  more  than 
friends  yes  Candace  and  Quentin  more  than  friends 
Father  I  have  committed  what  a  pity  you  had  no  brother 
or  sister  No  sister  no  sister  had  no  sister  Dont  ask  Quen- 
tin he  and  Mr  Compson  both  feel  a  little  insulted  when 
I  am  strong  enough  to  come  down  to  the  table  I  am  going 
on  nerve  now  111  pay  for  it  after  it's  all  over  and  you 
have  taken  my  little  daughter  away  from  me  My  little 
sister  had  no.  If  I  could  say  Mother.  Mother 

Unless  I  do  what  I  am  tempted  to  and  take  you  in- 
stead I  dont  think  Mr  Compson  could  overtake  the  car. 

Ah  Herbert  Candace  do  you  hear  that  She  wouldn't 
look  at  me  soft  stubborn  jaw-angle  not  back-looking 
You  needn't  be  jealous  though  it's  just  an  old  woman  he's 
flattering  a  grown  married  daughter  I  cant  believe  it. 

Nonsense  you  look  like  a  girl  you  are  lots  younger  than 
Candace  colour  in  your  cheeks  like  a  girl  A  fare  reproach- 
ful tearful  an  odour  of  camphor  and  of  tears  a  voice 
weeping  steadily  and  softly  beyond  the  twilit  door  the 
twilight-coloured  smell  of  honeysuckle.  Bringing  empty 
trunks  down  the  attic  stairs  they  sounded  like  coffins 
French  Lick.  Found  not  death  at  the  salt  lick 

Hats  not  unbleached  and  not  hats.  In  three  years  I  can 
not  wear  a  hat.  I  could  not.  Was.  Will  there  be  hats  then 
since  I  was  not  and  not  Harvard  then.  Where  the  best  of 
thought  Father  said  clings  like  dead  ivy  vines  upon  old 
dead  brick.  Not  Harvard  then.  Not  to  me,  anyway.  Again. 
Sadder  than  was.  Again.  Saddest  of  all.  Again. 

Spoade  had  a  shirt  on;  then  it  must  be.  When  I  can  see 
my  shadow  again  if  not  careful  that  I  tricked  into  the 
Water  shall  tread  again  upon  my  impervious  shadow.  But 


THE      SOU2STD      AND      THE      FTJBY         HJ 

no  sister,  I  wouldn't  have  done  it.  I  wont  have  my  daugh- 
ter spied  on  I  wouldn't  have. 

How  can  I  control  any  of  them  when  you  have  always 
taught  them  to  have  no  respect  for  me  and  my  wishes  I 
know  you  look  down  on  my  people  but  is  that  any  rea- 
son for  teaching  my  children  my  own  children  I  suf- 
fered for  to  have  no  respect  Trampling  my  shadow's 
bones  into  the  concrete  with  hard  heels  and  then  I  was 
hearing  the  watch,  and  I  touched  the  letters  through  my 
coat. 

I  will  not  have  my  daughter  spied  on  by  you  or  Quen- 
Zin  or  anybody  no  matter  what  you  think  she  has  done 

At  least  you  agree  there  is  reason  for  having  her 
toatched 

I  wouldn't  have  I  wouldn't  have.  I  know  you  wouldnt 
I  didn't  mean  to  speak  so  sharply  but  women  have  no 
respect  for  each  other  for  themselves 

But  why  did  she  The  chimes  began  as  I  stepped  on  my 
shadow,  but  it  was  the  quarter  hour.  The  Deacon  wasn't 
in  sight  anywhere,  think  I  would  have  could  have 

She  didnt  mean  that  that's  the  way  women  do  things 
its  because  she  loves  Caddy 

The  street  lamps  would  go  down  the  hill  then  rise  to* 
ward  town  I  walked  upon  the  belly  of  my  shadow.  I 
could  extend  my  hand  beyond  it.  feeling  Father  behind 
me  beyond  the  rasping  darkness  of  summer  and  August 
the  street  lamps  Father  and  I  protect  women  from  one 
another  from  themselves  our  women  Women  are  like  that 
they  dont  acquire  knowledge  of  people  we  are  for  that 
they  are  just  born  with  a  practical  fertility  of  suspicion 
that  makes  a  crop  every  so  often  and  usually  right  they 
have  an  affinity  for  evil  for  supplying  whatever  the  evil 
lacks  in  itself  for  drawing  it  about  them  instinctively  as 
you  do  bedclothing  in  slumber  fertilising  the  mind  for  it 


THE     SOXJJNTB     AND      THE     FURY 

until  the  evil  has  served  its  purpose  whether  it  ever  ex~ 
isted  or  no  He  was  coming  along  between  a  couple  of 
freshman.  He  hadn't  quite  recovered  from  the  parade,  for 
he  gave  me  a  salute,  a  very  superior-officerish  land. 

**I  want  to  see  you  a  minute/'  I  said,  stopping. 

"See  me?  All  right*  See  you  again,  fellows,"  he  said, 
Stopping  and  turning  back;  ""glad  to  have  chatted  with 
you."  That  was  the  Deacon,  all  over.  Talk  about  your  nat- 
ural psychologists.  They  said  he  hadn't  missed  a  train  at 
the  beginning  of  school  in  forty  years,  and  that  he  could 
pick  out  a  Southerner  with  one  glance.  He  never  missed, 
and  once  he  had  heard  you  speak,  he  could  name  your 
state.  He  had  a  regular  uniform  he  met  trains  in,  a  sort  of 
Uncle  Tom's  cabin  outfit,  patches  and  all. 

Tes,  suh.  Right  dis  way,  young  rnarster,  hyer  we  is," 
taking  you*  bags.  "Hyer,  boy,  come  hyer  and  git  dese 
grips."  Whereupon  a  moving  mountain  of  luggage  would 
edge  up,  revealing  a  white  boy  of  about  fifteen,  and  the 
Deacon  would  hang  another  bag  on  him  somehow  and 
drive  him  off.  "Now,  den,  dont  you  drap  hit.  Yes,  suh, 
young  marster,  jes  give  de  old  nigger  yo  room  number, 
and  hit'll  be  done  got  cold  dar  when  you  arrives." 

From  then  on  until  he  had  you  completely  subjugated 
he  was  always  in  or  out  of  your  room,  ubiquitous  and  gar- 
rulous, though  his  manner  gradually  moved  northward 
as  his  raiment  improved,  until  at  last  when  he  had  bled 
you  until  you  began  to  learn  better  he  was  calling  you 
Quentin  or  whatever,  and  when  you  saw  him  next  he'd  be 
Wearing  a  cast-off  Brooks  suit  and  a  hat  with  a  Princeton 
club  I  forget  which  band  that  someone  had  given  him 
and  which  he  was  pleasantly  and  unshakably  convinced 
was  a  part  of  Abe  Lincoln's  military  sash.  Someone 
spread  the  story  years  ago,  when  he  first  appeared  around 
college  from  wherever  he  came  from,  that  he  was  a  grad- 


THE     SOUND     AXD     THE     FTJBT         *  */ 

uate  of  the  divinity  school.  And  when  he  came  to  under- 
stand what  it  meant  he  was  so  taken  with  it  that  lie  be- 
gan to  retail  the  story  himself,  until  at  last  he  must  come 
to  believe  he  really  had.  Anyway  he  related  long  point- 
less anecdotes  of  his  undergraduate  days7  speaking  famil- 
iarly of  dead  and  departed  professors  by  their  first  names, 
usually  incorrect  ones.  But  he  had  been  guide  mentor 
and  friend  to  unnumbered  crops  of  innocent  and  lonely 
freshmen,  and  I  suppose  that  with  all  his  petty  chicanery 
and  hypocrisy  he  stank  no  higher  in  heaven's  nostrils  thao 
any  other. 

"Haven't  seen  you  in  three-four  days/'  he  said,  staring 
at  me  from  his  still  military  aura.  "You  been  sick?" 

"No.  I've  been  all  right.  Working,  I  reckon.  IVe  seen 
you,  though/' 

"Yes?" 

'In  the  parade  the  other  day." 

"Oh,  that.  Yes,  I  was  there.  I  dont  care  nothing  about 
that  sort  of  thing,  you  understand,  but  the  boys  likes  to 
have  me  with  them,  the  vet'runs  does.  Ladies  wants  all 
the  old  vet'runs  to  turn  out,  you  know.  So  I  has  to  oblige 
them." 

"And  on  that  Wop  holiday  too,"  I  said.  "You  were  ob- 
liging the  W.  C.  T.  U.  then,  I  reckon." 

"That?  I  was  doing  that  for  my  son-in-law.  He  aims  to 
get  a  job  on  the  city  forces.  Street  cleaner.  I  tells  him 
all  he  wants  is  a  broom  to  sleep  on.  You  saw  me,  did 
you?" 

"Both  times.  Yes." 

"I  mean,  in  uniform.  How'd  I  look?" 

"You  looked  fine.  You  looked  better  than  any  of  them. 
They  ought  to  make  you  a  general,  Deacon." 

He  touched  my  arm,  lightly,  his  hand  that  worn,  gentle 
quality  of  niggers'  hands.  "Listen.  This  aint  for  outside 


118         THE     SOUoSTD     AND     THE 

talking.  I  dont  mind  telling  you  because  you  and  me's 
the  same  folks,  come  long  and  short."  He  leaned  a  little 
to  me,  speaking  rapidly,  his  eyes  not  looking  at  me.  "I've 
got  strings  out,  right  now.  Wait  till  next  year.  Just  wait. 
Then  see  where  I'm  marching.  I  wont  need  to  tell  you 
how  I'm  fixing  it;  I  say,  just  wait  and  see,  my  boy."  He 
looked  at  me  now  and  clapped  me  lightly  on  the  shoul- 
der and  rocked  back  on  his  heels,  nodding  at  me.  "Yes, 
sir.  I  didnt  turn  Democrat  three  years  ago  for  nothing. 
My  son-in-law  on  the  city;  me — Yes,  sir.  If  just  turning 
Demccratll  make  that  son  of  a  bitch  go  to  work.  .  .  . 
And  me:  just  you  stand  on  that  corner  yonder  a  year 
from  two  days  ago,  and  see." 

"I  hope  so.  You  deserve  it,  Deacon.  And  while  I  think 
about  it — "  I  took  the  letter  from  my  pocket.  "'Take  this 
around  to  rny  room  tomorrow  and  give  it  to  Shreve.  He'll 
have  something  for  you.  But  not  till  tomorrow,  mind." 

He  took  the  letter  and  examined  it.  "It's  sealed  up/" 

"Yes.  And  it's  written  inside,  Not  good  until  to- 
morrow." 

"H'm,"  he  said.  He  looked  at  the  envelope,  his  month 
pursed.  "Something  for  me,  you  say?" 

"Yes.  A  present  I'm  making  you/* 

He  was  looking  at  me  now,  the  envelope  white  in  his 
black  hand,  in  the  sun.  His  eyes  were  soft  and  irisless  and 
brown,  and  suddenly  I  saw  Roskus  watching  me  from 
behind  all  his  whitefolks*  claptrap  of  uniforms  and  poli- 
tics and  Harvard  manner,  diffident,  secret,  inarticulate 
and  sad.  "You  aint  playing  a  joke  on  the  old  nigger,  is 
you?" 

"You  know  I'm  not.  Did  any  Southerner  ever  play  a 
joke  on  you?" 

"You're  right.  They're  fine  folks.  But  you  cant  live  with 
them." 


THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FTJBY 

"Did  you  ever  try?"  I  said.  But  Roskus  was  gone.  Once 
more  he  was  that  self  he  had  long  since  taught  himself 
to  wear  in  the  world's  eye,  pompous,  spurious,  not  quit® 
gross. 

'I'll  confer  to  your  wishes,  my  boy." 

"Not  until  tomorrow,  remember." 

"Sure/'  he  said;  "understood,  my  boy.  Well — " 

"I  hope — "  I  said.  He  looked  down  at  me,  benignant, 
profound.  Suddenly  I  held  out  my  hand  and  we  shook, 
he  gravely,  from  the  pompous  height  of  his  municipal 
and  military  dream.  "You're  a  good  fellow,  Deacon.  I 
hope.  .  .  .  You've  helped  a  lot  of  young  fellows,  here  and 
there/' 

"I've  tried  to  treat  all  folks  right,"  he  said.  "I  draw  no 
petty  social  lines.  A  man  to  me  is  a  man,  wherever  I  find 
him." 

"I  hope  you'll  always  find  as  many  friends  as  youV© 
made/' 

"Young  fellows.  I  get  along  with  them.  They  dont  for- 
get me,  neither,"  he  said,  waving  the  envelope.  He  put  it 
into  his  pocket  and  buttoned  his  coat.  "Yes,  sir,"  he  said, 
"I've  had  good  friends." 

The  chimes  began  again,  the  half  hour.  I  stood  in  the 
belly  of  my  shadow  and  listened  to  the  strokes  spaced 
and  tranquil  along  the  sunlight,  among  the  thin,  still  little 
leaves.  Spaced  and  peaceful  and  serene,  with  that  quality 
of  autumn  always  in  bells  even  in  the  month  of  brides* 
Lying  on  the  ground  winder \  the  window  bellowing  He 
took  one  look  at  her  and  knew.  Out  of  the  mouths  of 
babes.  The  street  lamps  The  chimes  ceased.  I  went  back 
to  the  postoffice,  treading  my  shadow  into  pavement,  go 
down  the  hill  then  they  rise  toward  town  like  lanterns 
hung  one  above  another  on  a  wall.  Father  said  because 
she  loves  Caddy  she  loves  people  through  their  short* 


THE     SOUN'B     AND     THE     FURY 

comings.  Uncle  Maury  straddling  his  legs  before  the  fire 
must  remove  one  hand  long  enough  to  drink  Christmas. 
Jason  ran  on,  his  hands  in  his  pockets  fell  down  and  lay 
there  like  a  trussed  fowl  until  Versh  set  him  up.  Whynt 
you  keep  them  hands  outen  your  pockets  when  you  run- 
ning you  could  stand  up  then  Rolling  his  head  in  the 
cradle  rolling  it  flat  across  the  back.  Caddy  told  Jason 
Versh  said  that  the  reason  Uncle  Maury  didn't  work  was 
that  he  used  to  roll  his  head  in  the  cradle  when  he  was 
little. 

Shreve  was  coming  up  the  walk,  shambling,  fatly  ear- 
nest, his  glasses  glinting  beneath  the  running  leaves  like 
little  pools. 

"I  gave  Deacon  a  note  for  some  things.  I  may  not  be 
in  this  afternoon,  so  dont  you  let  him  have  anything  until 
tomorrow,  will  you?" 

"All  right/'  He  looked  at  me.  "Say,  what're  you  doing 
today,  anyhow?  All  dressed  up  and  mooning  around  like 
the  prologue  to  a  suttee.  Did  you  go  to  Psychology  this 
morning?" 

"I'm  not  doing  anything.  Not  until  tomorrow,  now." 

"What's  that  you  got  there?" 

"Nothing.  Pair  of  shoes  I  had  half -soled.  Not  until  to- 
morrow, you  hear?" 

"Sure.  All  right.  Oh,  by  the  way,  did  you  get  a  letter 
off  the  table  this  morning?" 

"No." 

"It's  there.  From  Semiramis.  Chauffeur  brought  it  be- 
fore ten  o'clock." 

"All  right.  I'll  get  it  Wonder  what  she  wants  now." 

"Another  band  recital,  I  guess.  Tumpty  ta  ta  Gerald 
blah.  *A  little  louder  on  the  drum,  Quentin.'  God,  I'm  glad 
I'm  not  a  gentleman."  He  went  on,  nursing  a  book,  a  little 
shapeless,  fatly  intent  The  street  lamps  do  you  think  so 


THE     SOUND     AND      THE     IFURY 

because  one  of  our  forefathers  was  a  governor  and  three 
were  generals  and  Mother's  weren't 

any  live  man  is  better  than  any  dead  man  but  no  live 
or  dead  man  is  very  much  better  than  any  other  live  or 
dead  man  Done  in  Mather's  mind  though.  Finished.  Fin- 
ished. Then  we  were  all  poisoned  you  are  confusing  sin 
and  morality  women  dont  do  that  your  Mother  is  think- 
ing of  morality  whether  it  be  sin  or  not  has  not  occurred 
to  her 

Jason  I  must  go  away  you  keep  the  others  111  take  Ja- 
son and  go  where  nobody  knows  us  so  he'll  have  a  chance 
to  grow  up  and  forget  all  this  the  others  dont  love  me 
they  have  never  loved  anything  with  that  streak  of 
Compson  selfishness  and  false  pride  Jason  was  the  only 
one  my  heart  went  out  to  without  dread 

nonsense  Jason  is  all  right  I  was  thinking  that  as  soon 
as  you  feel  better  you  and  Caddy  might  go  up  to  French 
Lick 

and  leave  Jason  here  with  nobody  but  you  and  the 
darkies 

she  will  forget  him  then  all  the  talk  will  die  away 
-found  not  deatti  at  the  salt  licks 

maybe  I  could  find  a  husband  for  her  not  death  at  the 
salt  licks 

The  car  came  up  and  stopped.  The  bells  were  still  ring- 
ing the  half  hour.  I  got  on  and  it  went  on  again,  blotting 
the  half  hour.  No:  the  three  quarters.  Then  it  would  be 
ten  minutes  anyway.  To  leave  Harvard  your  Mothers 
dream  for  sold  Benfy's  pasture  for 

what  have  I  done  to  have  been  given  children  like 
these  Benjamin  was  punishment  enough  and  now  for  her 
to  have  no  more  regard  for  me  her  own  mother  I've  suf- 
fered for  her  dreamed  and  planned  and  sacrificed  I  went 
down  into  the  valley  yet  never  since  she  opened  her  eyes 


122,        THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FUBY 

has  she  given  me  one  unselfish  thought  at  times  I  look  at 
her  I  wonder  if  she  can  be  my  child  except  Jason  he  has 
never  given  me  one  moments  sorrow  since  I  first  held 
him  in  my  arms  I  knew  then  that  he  was  to  be  my  joy 
and  my  salvation  I  thought  that  Benjamin  was  punish- 
ment enough  for  any  sins  I  have  committed  I  thought  he 
was  rny  punishment  for  putting  aside  my  pride  and  mar- 
rying a  man  who  held  himself  above  me  I  dont  complain 
I  loved  him  above  all  of  them  because  of  it  because  my 
duty  though  Jason  pulling  at  my  heart  all  the  while  but 
I  see  now  that  I  have  not  suffered  enough  I  see  now  that 
I  must  pay  for  your  sins  as  well  as  mine  what  have  you 
done  what  sins  have  your  high  and  mighty  people  visited 
upon  me  but  youll  take  up  for  them  you  always  have 
found  excuses  for  your  own  blood  only  Jason  can  do 
wrong  because  he  is  more  Bascomb  than  Compson  while 
your  own  daughter  my  little  daughter  my  baby  girl  she 
Is  she  is  no  better  than  that  when  I  was  a  girl  I  was  un- 
fortunate I  was  only  a  Bascomb  I  was  taught  that  there 
is  no  halfway  ground  that  a  woman  is  either  a  lady  or 
tiot  but  I  never  dreamed  when  I  held  her  in  my  arms 
that  any  daughter  of  mine  could  let  herself  dont  you 
know  I  can  look  at  her  eyes  and  tell  you  may  think  she'd 
tell  you  but  she  doesn't  tell  things  she  is  secretive  you 
dont  know  her  I  know  things  she's  done  that  I'd  die  be- 
fore I'd  have  you  know  that's  it  go  on  criticise  Jason  ac- 
cuse me  of  setting  him  to  ^atch  her  as  if  it  were  a  crime 
while  yoov  own  daughter  can  I  know  you  dont  love  him 
that  yvu  wish  to  believe  faults  against  him  you  never 
have  yes  ridicule  him  as  you  always  have  Maury  you 
cannot  hurt  me  any  more  than  your  children  already 
have  and  then  111  be  gone  and  Jason  with  no  one  to  love 
him  shield  him  from  this  I  look  at  him  every  day  dread- 
lag  to  see  this  Compson  blood  beginning  to  show  in  him 


TiiE     SOUND     AXD     THE     FURY        123 

at  last  with  his  sister  slipping  out  to  see  what  do  you  call 
it  then  have  you  ever  laid  eyes  on  him  will  you  even  let 
me  try  to  find  out  who  he  Is  it's  not  for  myself  I  couldn't 
bear  to  see  him  it's  for  your  sake  to  protect  you  but  who 
can  fight  against  bad  blood  you  wont  let  me  try  we  are 
to  sit  back  with  our  hands  folded  while  she  not  only 
drags  your  name  in  the  dirt  but  corrupts  the  very  air  your 
children  breathe  Jason  you  must  let  me  go  away  I  cannot 
stand  it  let  me  have  Jason  and  you  keep  the  others  they're 
not  my  flesh  and  blood  like  he  is  strangers  nothing  of 
mine  and  I  am  afraid  of  them  I  can  take  Jason  and  go 
where  we  are  not  known  111  go  down  on  my  knees  and 
pray  for  the  absolution  of  my  sins  that  he  may  escape 
this  curse  try  to  forget  that  the  others  ever  were 

If  that  was  the  three  quarters,  not  over  ten  minutes 
now.  One  car  had  just  left,  and  people  were  already  wait- 
ing for  the  next  one.  I  asked,  but  he  didn't  know  whethei 
another  one  would  leave  before  noon  or  not  because 
you'd  think  that  interurbans.  So  the  first  one  was  anothel 
trolley.  I  got  on.  You  can  feel  noon.  I  wonder  if  even 
miners  in  the  bowels  of  the  earth.  That's  why  whistles: 
because  people  that  sweat,  and  if  just  far  enough  from 
sweat  you  wont  hear  whistles  and  in  eight  minutes  you 
should  be  that  far  from  sweat  in  Boston.  Father  said  a 
man  is  the  sum  of  his  misfortunes.  One  day  you'd  think 
misfortune  would  get  tired,  but  then  time  is  your  misfor- 
tune Father  said.  A  gull  on  an  invisible  wire  attached 
through  space  dragged.  You  carry  the  symbol  of  your 
frustration  into  eternity.  Then  the  wings  are  biggei 
Father  said  only  who  can  play  a  harp. 

I  could  hear  my  watch  whenever  the  car  stopped,  but 
not  often  they  were  already  eating  Who  would  play  a 
Eating  the  business  of  eating  inside  of  you  space  to 
space  and  time  confused  Stomach  saying  noon  brain,  say- 


124        THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FURY 

ing  eat  oclock  All  right  I  wonder  what  time  it  is  what  of 
it  People  were  getting  out  The  trolley  didn't  stop  so 
often  now,  emptied  by  eating. 

Then  it  was  past,  I  got  off  and  stood  in  my  shadow 
and  after  a  while  a  car  came  along  and  I  got  on  and 
went  back  to  the  interurban  station.  There  was  a  car 
ready  to  leave,  and  I  found  a  seat  next  the  window  and 
it  started  and  I  watched  it  sort  of  frazzle  out  into  slack 
tide  flats,  and  then  trees.  Now  and  then  I  saw  the  river 
and  I  thought  how  nice  it  would  be  for  them  down  at 
New  London  if  the  weather  and  Gerald's  shell  going  sol- 
emnly up  the  glinting  forenoon  and  I  wondered  what 
the  old  woman  would  be  wanting  now,  sending  me  a 
note  before  ten  oclock  in  the  morning.  What  picture  of 
Gerald  I  to  be  one  of  the  Dalton  Ames  oh  asbestos  Quen- 
tin  lias  shot  background.  Something  with  girls  in  it 
Women  do  have  always  his  voice  above  the  gabble  voice 
that  breathed  an  affinity  for  evil,  for  believing  that  no 
to^oman  is  to  be  trusted,  but  that  some  men  are  too  inno- 
cent to  protect  themselves.  Plain  girls.  Remote  cousins 
and  family  friends  whom  mere  acquaintanceship  invested 
with  a  sort  of  blood  obligation  noblesse  oblige.  And  she 
sitting  there  telling  us  before  their  faces  what  a  shame  it 
was  that  Gerald  should  have  all  the  family  looks  be- 
eause  a  man  didn't  need  it,  was  better  off  without  it  but 
without  it  a  girl  was  simply  lost  Telling  us  about  Ger- 
ald's women  in  a  Quentin  has  shot  Herbert  he  shot  his 
voice  through  the  floor  of  Caddy's  room  tone  of  smug  ap- 
probation. 'When  he  was  seventeen  I  said  to  him  one 
iay  'What  a  shame  that  you  should  have  a  mouth  like 
that  it  should  be  on  a  girls  face'  and  can  you  imagine  the 
curtains  leaning  in  on  the  twilight  upon  the  odour  of  the 
apple  tree  her  h@ad  against  the  twilight  her  arms  behind 
her  head  kimono-winged  the  voice  that  breathed 


THE     SQTJKD     AKB     THE     FURY 

eden  clothes  upon  the  bed  by  the  nose  seen  above  the 
apple  what  he  said?  just  seventeen,  mind.  'Mother*  he 
said  'it  often  is.' "  And  him  sitting  there  in  attitudes  regaf 
watching  two  or  three  of  them  through  his  eyelashes, 
They  gushed  like  swallows  swooping  his  eyelashes. 
Shreve  said  he  always  had  Are  you  going  to  look  after 
Eenjy  and  Father 

The  less  you  say  about  Benjy  and  Father  the  better 
when  have  you  ever  considered  them  Caddy 

Promise 

Jou  neednt  worry  about  them  you're  getting  out  in 
good  shape 

Promise  Fm  sick  you  II  have  to  promise  wondered  who 
invented  that  joke  but  then  he  always  had  considered 
Mrs  Bland  a  remarkably  preserved  woman  he  said  she 
was  grooming  Gerald  to  seduce  a  duchess  sometime.  She 
called  Shreve  that  fat  Canadian  youth  twice  she  ar- 
ranged a  new  room-mate  for  me  without  consulting  me 
at  all,  once  for  me  to  move  out,  once  for 

He  opened  the  door  in  the  twilight.  His  face  looked 
like  a  pumpkin  pie, 

"Well,  I'll  say  a  fond  farewell.  Cruel  fate  may  part  us, 
but  I  will  never  love  another.  Never." 

"What  are  you  talking  about?" 

"I'm  talking  about  cruel  fate  in  eight  yards  of  apricot 
silk  and  more  metal  pound  for  pound  that  a  galley  slave 
and  the  sole  owner  and  proprietor  of  the  unchallenged 
peripatetic  John  of  the  late  Confederacy  "  Then  he  told 
me  how  she  had  gone  to  the  proctor  to  have  him  moved 
out  and  how  the  proctor  had  revealed  enough  low  stub- 
bornness to  insist  on  consulting  Shreve  first.  Then  she 
suggested  that  he  send  for  Shreve  right  off  and  do  it,  and 
lie  wouldnt  do  that,  so  after  that  she  was  hardly  civil  to 
Shreve.  "1  make  it  a  point  never  to  speak  harshly  of  fe- 


12.6        THE      SOUND     AND     THE 

males/'  Shreve  said,  "but  that  woman  has  got  more  ways 
like  a  bitch  than  any  lady  in  these  sovereign  states  and 
dominions."  and  now  Letter  on  the  table  by  hand,  com- 
mand orchid  scented  coloured  If  she  knew  I  had  passed 
almost  beneath  the  window  knowing  it  there  without  My 
dear  Madam  I  have  not  yet  had  an  opportunity  of  receiv- 
ing your  communication  but  I  beg  in  advance  to  be  ex- 
cused today  or  yesterday  and  tomorrow  or  when  As  I  re- 
member that  the  next  one  is  to  be  how  Gerald  throws  his 
nigger  downstairs  and  how  the  nigger  plead  to  be  al- 
lowed to  matriculate  in  the  divinity  school  to  be  near 
marster  marse  gerald  and  How  he  ran  all  the  way  to  the 
station  beside  the  carriage  with  tears  in  his  eyes  when 
marse  gerald  rid  away  I  will  wait  until  the  day  for  the 
one  about  the  sawmill  husband  came  to  the  kitchen  door 
with  a  shotgun  Gerald  went  down  and  bit  the  gun  in  two 
and  handed  it  back  and  wiped  his  hands  on  a  silk  hand- 
kerchief threw  the  handkerchief  in  the  stove  I've  only 
heard  that  one  twice 

shot  him  through  the  I  saw  you  come  in  here  so  I 
Watched  my  chance  and  came  along  thought  we  might 
get  acquainted  have  a  cigar 

Thanks  I  dont  smoke 

No  things  must  have  changed  up  there  since  my  day 
mind  if  I  light  up 

Help  yourself 

Thanks  I've  heard  a  lot  I  guess  your  mother  wont  mind 
if  I  put  the  match  behind  the  screen  will  she  a  lot  about 
you  Candace  talked  about  you  all  the  time  up  there  at 
the  Licks  I  got  pretty  jealous  I  says  to  -myself  who  is  this 
Quentin  anyway  I  must  see  what  this  animal  looks  like 
because  I  was  hit  pretty  hard  see  soon  as  I  saw  the  little 
girl  I  dont  mind  telling  you  it  never  occurred  to  me  it  was 
her  brother  she  kept  talking  about  she  couldnt  have 


THE     SOUND     AND     THJ5S     FUBY 

talked  about  you  any  more  if  you'd  been  the  only  man 
in  the  world  husband  wouldnt  have  been  in  it  you  wont 
change  your  mind  and  have  a  smoke 

I  dont  smoke 

In  that  case  I  wont  insist  even  though  it  is  a  pretty  fail 
weed  cost  me  twenty-five  bucks  a  hundred  wholesale 
friend  in  Havana  yes  I  guess  there  are  lots  of  changes  up 
there  I  keep  promising  myself  a  visit  but  I  never  get 
around  to  it  been  hitting  the  ball  now  for  ten  years  I  cant 
get  away  from  the  bank  during  school  fellow's  habits 
change  things  that  seem  important  to  an  undergraduate 
you  know  tell  me  about  things  up  there 

I'm  not  going  to  tell  Father  and  Mother  if  that's  what 
you  are  getting  at 

Not  going  to  tell  not  going  to  oh  that  that's  what  you 
are  talking  about  is  it  you  understand  that  I  dont  give  a 
damn  whether  you  tell  or  not  understand  that  a  thing 
like  that  unfortunate  but  no  police  crime  I  wasn't  the  first 
or  the  last  I  was  just  unlucky  you  might  have  been  luck- 
ier 

You  lie 

Keep  your  shirt  on  I'm  not  trying  to  make  you  tell  any- 
thing you  dont  want  to  meant  no  offense  of  course  a 
young  fellow  like  you  would  consider  a  thing  of  that  sort 
a  lot  more  serious  than  you  will  in  five  years 

I  dont  know  but  one  way  to  consider  cheating  I  dont 
think  I'm  likely  to  learn  different  at  Harvard 

We're  better  than  a  play  you  must  have  made  the 
Dramat  well  you're  right  no  need  to  tell  them  well  let 
bygones  be  bygones  eh  no  reason  why  you  and  I  should 
let  a  little  thing  like  that  come  between  us  I  like  you 
Quentin  I  like  your  appearance  you  dont  look  like  these 
other  hicks  I'm  glad  we're  going  to  hit  off  like  this  IVe 
promised  your  mother  to  do  something  for  Jason  but  I 


12*        THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FURY 

would  like  to  give  you  a  hand  too  Jason  would  be  just  as 
well  off  here  but  there's  no  future  in  a  hole  like  this  for  a 
young  fellow  like  you 

Thanks  you'd  better  stick  to  Jason  he'd  suit  you  better 
than  I  would 

I'm  sorry  about  that  business  but  a  kid  like  I  was  then 
I  never  had  a  mother  like  yours  to  teach  me  the  finer 
points  it  would  just  hurt  her  unnecessarily  to  know  it  yes 
you're  right  no  need  to  that  includes  Candace  of  course 

I  said  Mother  and  Father 

Look  here  take  a  look  at  me  how  long  do  you  think 
you'd  last  with  me 

I  wont  have  to  last  long  if  you  learned  to  fight  up  at 
school  too  try  and  see  how  long  L  would 

You  damned  little    what  do  you  think  you're  getting  at 

Try  and  see 

My  God  the  cigar  what  would  your  mother  say  if  she 
found  a  blister  on  her  mantel  just  in  time  too  look  here 
Quentin  we're  about  to  do  something  we'll  both  regret  I 
like  you  liked  you  as  soon  as  I  saw  you  I  says  he  must  be 
a  damned  good  fellow  whoever  he  is  or  Candace  wouldnt 
be  so  keen  on  him  listen  I've  been  out  in  the  world  now 
for  ten  years  things  dont  matter  so  much  then  you'll  find 
that  out  let's  you  and  I  get  together  on  this  thing  sons  of 
old  Harvard  and  all  I  guess  I  wouldnt  know  the  place 
now  best  place  for  a  young  fellow  in  the  world  I'm  going 
to  send  my  sons  there  give  them  a  better  chance  than  I 
had  wait  dont  go  yet  let's  discuss  this  thing  a  young  man 
gets  these  ideas  and  I'm  all  for  them  does  him  good  while 
he's  in  school  forms  his  character  good  for  tradition  the 
school  but  when  he  gets  out  into  the  world  he'll  have  to 
get  his  the  best  way  he  can  because  he'll  find  that  every- 
body else  is  doing  the  same  thing  and  be  damned  to  here 


THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FURY        129 

let's  shake  hands  and  let  bygones  be  bygones  for  your 
mother's  sake  remember  her  health  come  on  give  me  your 
hand  here  look  at  it  it's  just  out  of  convent  look  not  a 
blemish  not  even  been  creased  yet  see  here 

To  hell  with  your  money 

No  no  come  on  I  belong  to  the  family  now  see  I  know 
how  it  is  with  a  young  fellow  he  has  lots  of  private  af- 
fairs it's  always  pretty  hard  to  get  the  old  man  to  stump 
up  for  I  know  havent  I  been  there  and  not  so  long  ago 
either  but  now  I'm  getting  married  and  all  specially  up 
there  come  on  dont  be  a  fool  listen  when  we  get  a  chance 
for  a  real  talk  I  want  to  tell  you  about  a  little  widow 
over  in  town 

I've  heard  that  too  keep  your  damned  money 

Call  it  a  loan  then  just  shut  your  eyes  a  minute  and 
you'll  be  fifty 

Keep  your  hands  off  of  me  you'd  better  get  that  cigar 
off  the  mantel 

Tell  and  be  damned  then  see  what  it  gets  you  if  you 
were  not  a  damned  fool  you'd  have  seen  that  I've  got 
them  too  tight  for  any  half-baked  Galahad  of  a  brother 
your  mother's  told  me  about  your  sort  with  your  head 
swelled  up  come  in  oh  come  in  dear  Quentin  and  I  were 
just  getting  acquainted  talking  about  Harvard  did  you 
want  me  cant  stay  away  from  the  old  man  can  she 

Go  out  a  minute  Herbert  I  want  to  talk  to  Quentin 

Come  in  come  in  let's  all  have  a  gabfest  and  get  ac- 
quainted I  was  just  telling  Quentin 

Go  on  Herbert  go  out  a  while 

Well  all  right  then  I  suppose  you  and  bubber  do  want 
to  see  one  another  once  more  eli 

You'd  better  take  that  cigar  off  the  mantel 

Right  as  usual  my  bov  then  Til  toddle  along  let  them 


130        THE     SOUKD     AND     THE     PUBT 

order  you  around  while  they  can  Quentin  after  day  aftet 
tomorrow  itll  be  pretty  please  to  the  old  man  wont  it 
dear  give  us  a  kiss  honey 

Oh  stop  that  save  that  for  day  after  tomorrow 

All  want  interest  then  dont  let  Quentin  do  anything  he 
cant  finish  oh  by  the  way  did  I  tell  Quentin  the  story 
about  the  man's  parrot  and  what  happened  to  it  a  sad 
story  remind  me  of  that  think  of  it  yourself  ta-ta  see  you 
in  the  funnypaper 

Well 

Well 

What  are  you  up  to  now 

Nothing 

You're  meddling  in  my  business  again  didn't  you  get 
*aaough  of  that  last  summer 

Caddy  you've  got  fever  You're  sick  how  are  you  sick 

I'm  just  sick.  I  cant  ash 

Shot  his  voice  through  the 

Not  that  blackguard  Caddy 

Now  and  then  the  river  glinted  beyond  things  in  sort 
of  swooping  glints,  across  noon  and  after.  Well  after  now, 
though  we  had  passed  where  he  was  still  pulling  up* 
stream  majestical  in  the  face  of  god  gods.  Better.  Gods, 
God  would  be  canaille  too  in  Boston  Massachusetts. 
Or  maybe  just  not  a  husband.  The  wet  oars  winking 
him  along  in  bright  winks  and  female  palms.  Adulant 
Adulant  if  not  a  husband  he'd  ignore  God.  That  black- 
guard, Caddy  The  river  glinted  away  beyond  a  swoop- 
ing curve. 

I'm  sick  you'll  have  to  promise 

Sick  how  are  you  sick 

I'm  fust  sick  I  cant  ask  anybody  yet  promise  you  will 

If  they  need  any  looking  after  it's  because  of  you  how 
are  you  sick  Under  the  window  we  could  hear  the  car 


THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FTJET 

leaving  for  the  station,  the  8:10  train.  To  bring  back  cons* 
ins.  Heads,  Increasing  himself  head  by  head  but  not  bar- 
bers. Manicure  girls.  We  had  a  blood  horse  once.  In  the 
stable  yes,  but  under  leather  a  cur.  Quentin  lias  shot  att 
of  their  voices  through  the  floor  of  Caddy's  room 

The  car  stopped.  I  got  off,  into  the  middle  of  my 
shadow.  A  road  crossed  the  track.  There  was  a  wooden 
marquee  with  an  old  man  eating  something  out  of  a 
paper  bag,  and  then  the  car  was  out  of  hearing  too.  The 
road  went  into  the  trees,  where  it  would  be  shady,  but 
June  foliage  in  New  England  not  much  thicker  than  April 
at  home  in  Mississippi.  I  could  see  a  smoke  stack.  I 
turned  my  back  to  it,  tramping  my  shadow  into  the  dust, 
There  was  something  terrible  in  me  sometimes  at  night 
I  could  see  it  grinning  at  me  I  could  see  it  through  them 
grinning  at  me  through  their  faces  it's  gone  now  and  Fm 
sick 

Caddy 

Dont  touch  me  just  promise 

If  you  re  sick  you  cant 

Jes  I  can  after  that  it'll  be  all  right  it  wont  matter  dont 
let  them  send  him  to  Jackson  promise 

I  promise  Caddy  Caddy 

Dont  touch  me  dont  touch  me 

What  does  it  look  like  Caddy 

What 

That  that  grins  at  you  that  thing  through  them 

I  could  still  see  the  smoke  stack.  That's  where  the  watetf 
would  be,  heading  out  to  the  sea  and  the  peaceful  grot- 
toes. Tumbling  peacefully  they  would,  and  when  He  said 
Rise  only  the  flat  irons.  When  Versh  and  I  hunted  all  day 
we  wouldn't  take  any  lunch,  and  at  twelve  oclock  I'd  get 
hungry.  I'd  stay  hungry  until  about  one,  then  all  of  a  sud' 
den  I'd  even  forget  that  I  wasn't  hungry  anymore. 


THE     SOUND     AND     THE 

street  lamps  go  down  the  hill  then  heard  the  car  go  down 
the  hill.  The  chair-arm  -flat  cool  smooth  under  my  fore- 
head shaping  the  chair  the  apple  tree  leaning  on  my 
hair  above  the  eden  clothes  by  the  nose  seen  You've  got 
fever  I  felt  it  yesterday  it's  like  being  near  a  stove. 

Dont  touch  me. 

Caddy  you  cant  do  it  if  you  are  sick.  That  blackguard. 

I've  got  to  marry  somebody,  Then  they  told  me  the 
bone  would  have  to  be  broken  again 

At  last  I  couldn't  see  the  smoke  stack.  The  road  went 
beside  a  wall.  Trees  leaned  over  the  wall,  sprayed  with 
sunlight.  The  stone  was  cool.  Walking  near  it  you  could 
feel  the  coolness.  Only- our  country  was  not  like  this  coun- 
try. There  was  something  about  just  walking  through  it. 
A  kind  of  still  and  violent  fecundity  that  satisfied  ever 
bread-hunger  like.  Flowing  around  you,  not  brooding 
and  nursing  every  niggard  stone.  Like  it  were  put  to 
makeshift  for  enough  green  to  go  around  among  the  trees 
and  even  the  blue  of  distance  not  that  rich  chiinaera.  t old 
me  the  bone  would  have  to  be  broken  again  and  inside 
me  it  began  to  say  Ah  Ah  Ah  and  I  began  to  sweat.  What 
do  I  care  I  know  what  a  broken  leg  is  all  it  is  it  wont  be 
anything  Til  just  have  to  stay  in  the  house  a  little  longer 
that's  all  and  my  jaw-muscles  getting  numb  and  my 
mouth  saying  Wait  Wait  just  a  minute  through  the  sweat 
ah  ah  ah  behind  my  teeth  and  Father  damn  that  horse 
damn  that  horse.  Wait  it's  my  fault.  He  came  along  the 
fence  every  morning  with  a  basket  toward  the  kitchen 
dragging  a  stick  along  the  fence  every  morning  I  dragged 
myself  to  the  window  cast  and  all  and  laid  for  him  with  a 
piece  of  coal  Dilsey  said  you  goin  to  ruin  yoself  aint  you 
got  no  mo  sense  than  that  not  fo  days  since  you  bruck 
hit.  Wait  Til  get  used  to  it  in  a  minute  wait  just  a  minute 
FUget 


THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FURY         133 

Even  sound  seemed  to  fail  in  this  air,  like  the  air  was 
worn  out  with  carrying  sounds  so  long.  A  dog's  voice  car- 
ries further  than  a  train,  in  the  darkness  anyway.  And 
some  people's.  Niggers.  Louis  Hatcher  never  even  used  his 
horn  carrying  it  and  that  old  lantern.  I  said,  "Louis,  when 
was  the  last  time  you  cleaned  that  lantern?" 

"I  cleant  hit  a  little  while  back.  You  member  when 
all  dat  flood-watter  wash  dem  folks  away  up  yonder?  I 
cleant  hit  dat  ve'y  day.  Old  woman  and  me  settin  fore 
de  fire  dat  night  and  she  say  'Louis,  whut  you  gwine  do  ef 
dat  flood  git  out  dis  fur?'  and  I  say  'Dat's  a  fack.  I  reckon 
I  had  better  clean  dat  lantun  up.'  So  I  cleant  hit  dat 
night." 

"That  flood  was  way  up  in  Pennsylvania/*  I  said.  "It 
couldn't  even  have  got  down  this  far." 

"Dat's  whut  you  says/'  Louis  said.  **Watter  kin  git  des 
ez  high  en  wet  in  Jefferson  ez  hit  kin  in  Pennsylvaney,  I 
reckon.  Hit's  de  folks  dat  says  de  high  watter  cant  git 
dis  fur  dat  comes  floatin  out  on  de  ridge-pole,  too." 

"Did  you  and  Martha  get  out  that  night?" 

"We  done  jest  that.  I  cleant  dat  lantun  and  me  and  he* 
sot  de  balance  of  de  uight  on  top  o  dat  knoll  back  de 
graveyard.  En  ef  I'd  a  knowed  of  aihy  one  higher,  we'd  a 
been  on  hit  instead," 

*And  you  haven't  cleaned  that  lantern  since  then/' 

'Whut  I  want  to  clean  hit  when  dey  aint  no  need?" 

"You  mean,  until  another  flood  comes  along?" 

"Hit  kep  us  outen  dat  un." 

"Oh,  come  on,  Uncle  Louis/'  I  said, 

"Yes,  suh.  You  do  you  way  en  I  do  mine.  Ef  all  I  got  t$ 
do  to  keep  outen  de  high  watter  is  to  clean  dis  yer© 
lantun,  I  wont  quoil  wid  no  man." 

"Unc'  Louis  wouldn't  ketch  nothin  wid  a  light  he  cou!4 
see  by/*  Versh  said. 


TECE     SOUND     AND     THE     FURY 

"I  wuz  huntin  possums  in  dis  country  when  dey  was 
still  drowndin  nits  in  yo  pappy's  liead  wid  coal  oil,  boy,** 
Louis  said.  "Ketchin  urn,  too/' 

"Dat's  de  troof,"  Versii  said.  "I  reckon  Unc'  Louis  done 
caught  mo  possums  than  aihy  man  in  dis  country/7 

"Yes,  suh,"  Louis  said,  "I  got  plenty  light  f  er  possums  to 
see,  all  right.  1  aint  heard  non  o  dem  complainin.  Hush, 
now.  Dar  he.  Whooey.  Hum  awn,  dawg/'  And  we'd  sit 
in  the  dry  leaves  that  whispered  a  little  with  the  slow  res- 
piration of  our  waiting  and  with  the  slow  breathing  of 
the  earth  and  the  windless  October,  the  rank  smell  of 
the  lantern  fouling  the  brittle  air,  listening  to  the  dogs 
and  to  the  echo  of  Louis'  voice  dying  away.  He  never 
raised  it,  yet  on  a  still  night  we  have  heard  it  from  our 
front  porch.  When  he  called  the  dogs  in  he  sounded  just 
like  the  horn  he  carried  slung  on  his  shoulder  and  never 
used,  but  clearer,  mellower,  as  though  his  voice  were  a 
part  of  darkness  and  silence,  coiling  out  of  it,  coiling  into 
it  again.  WhoOoooo.  WhoOoooo.  WhoOoooooooooo- 
ooooo.  Got  to  marry  somebody 

Have  there  been  very  many  Caddy 

I  dont  "know  too  many  will  you  look  after  Benjy  and 
Father 

You  dont  know  whose  it  is  then  does  he  know 

Dont  touch  me  will  you  look  after  Benjy  and  Father 

I  began  to  feel  the  water  before  I  came  to  the  bridge. 
The  bridge  was  of  grey  stone,  lichened,  dappled  with 
slow  moisture  where  the  fungus  crept.  Beneath  it  the 
water  was  clear  and  still  in  the  shadow,  whispering  and 
clucking  about  the  stone  in  fading  swirls  of  spinning  sky. 
Caddy  that 

Fve  got  to  marry  somebody  Versh  told  me  about  a  man 
mutilated  himself.  He  went  into  the  woods  and  did  it 
With  a  razor,  sitting  in  a  ditch.  A  broken  razor,  flingina 


SOUISTD    AND    THE    FUKIT      135 

them  backward  over  his  shoulder  tne  same  motion  com- 
plete the  jerked  skein  of  blood  backward  not  looping. 
But  that's  not  it.  It's  not  not  having  them.  It's  never  to 
have  had  them  then  I  could  say  O  That  That's  Chinese 
I  dont  know  Chinese.  And  Fatter  said  it's  because  you 
are  a  virgin:  dont  you  see?  Women  are  never  virgins.  Pu- 
rity is  a  negative  state  and  therefore  contrary  to  nature, 
It's  nature  is  hurting  you  not  Caddy  and  I  said  That's  just 
words  and  he  said  So  is  virginity  and  I  said  you  dont 
tnow.  You  cant  know  and  he  said  Yes.  On  the  instant 
\vhen  we  come  to  realise  that  tragedy  is  second-hand. 

Where  the  shadow  of  the  bridge  fell  I  could  see 
down  for  a  long  way,  but  not  as  far  as  the  bottom.  When 
you  leave  a  leaf  in  water  a  long  time  after  awhile  the 
tissue  will  be  gone  and  the  delicate  fibers  waving  slow  as 
the  motion  of  sleep.  They  dont  touch  one  another,  no 
matter  how  knotted  up  they  once  were,  no  matter  how 
close  they  lay  once  to  the  bones.  And  maybe  when  He 
says  Rise  the  eyes  will  come  floating  up  too,  out  of  the 
deep  quiet  and  the  sleep,  to  look  on  glory.  And  after 
awhile  the  flat  irons  would  come  floating  up.  I  hid  them 
under  the  end  of  the  bridge  and  went  back  and  leaned 
on  the  rail. 

I  could  not  see  the  bottom,  but  I  could  see  a  long  way 
into  the  motion  of  the  water  before  the  eye  gave  out,  and 
then  I  saw  a  shadow  hanging  like  a  fat  arrow  stemming 
into  the  current.  Mayflies  skimmed  in  and  out  of  the 
shadow  of  the  bridge  just  above  the  surface.  If  it  could 
just  be  a  hell  beyond  tliat:  the  clean  -flame  the  two  of  us 
more  tlian  dead.  Then  you  will  have  only  me  then  only 
me  then  the  two  of  us  amid  the  pointing  and  the  horror 
beyond  the  clean  flame  The  arrow  increased  without  mo- 
tion, then  in  a  quick  swirl  the  trout  lipped  a  fly  beneath 
the  surface  with  that  sort  of  gigantic  delicacy  of  an  ele-» 


l$6        THE     SOUND     AND     THE-    FURY 

pliant  picking  up  a  peanut.  The  fading  vortex  drifted 
away  down  stream  and  then  I  saw  the  arrow  again,  nose 
into  the  current,  wavering  delicately  to  the  motion  of  the 
water  above  which  the  Mayflies  slanted  and  poised.  Only 
you  and  me  then  amid  the  pointing  and  the  horror  watted 
by  the  clean  -flame 

The  trout  hung?  delicate  and  motionless  among  the 
Wavering  shadows.  Three  boys  with  fishing  poles  came 
onto  the  bridge  and  we  leaned  on  the  rail  and  looked 
down  at  the  trout.  They  knew  the  fish.  He  was  a  neigh- 
bourhood character. 

"They've  been  trying  to  catch  that  trout  for  twenty-five 
years.  There's  a  store  in  Boston  offers  a  twenty-five  dollar 
fishing  rod  to  anybody  that  can  catch  him." 

"Why  dont  you  all  catch  him,  then?  Wouldnt  you  like 
to  have  a  twenty-five  dollar  fishing  rod?" 

**Yes,"  they  said*  They  leaned  on  the  rail,  looking 
down  at  the  trout.  "I  sure  would/'  one  said. 

*1  wouldnt  take  the  rod/'  the  second  said.  *Td  take  the 
money  instead." 

"Maybe  they  wouldnt  do  that,"  the  first  said.  "I  bet 
lie'd  make  you  take  the  rod." 

'Then  I'd  sell  it." 

'Ton  couldnt  get  twenty-five  dollars  for  it* 

'I'd  take  what  I  could  get,  then.  I  can  catch  just  as 
Biany  fish  with  this  pole  as  I  could  with  a  twenty-five  dol- 
lar one."  Then  they  talked  about  what  they  would  do 
with  twenty-five  dollars.  They  all  talked  at  once,  their 
voices  insistent  and  contradictory  and  impatient,  making 
of  unreality  a  possibility,  then  a  probability,  then  an  in- 
controvertible fact,  as  people  will  when  their  desires  be- 
come words. 

'I'd  buy  a  horse  and  wagon,"  the  second  said. 

*TTes  you  would,"  the  others  said. 


THE     SOU3STB     AND     THE     FUB1T        *37 

"I  would.  I  know  where  I  can  buy  one  for  twenty-five 
dollars.  I  know  the  man." 

•Who  Is  it?" 

"That's  all  right  who  it  is,  I  can  buy  it  for  twenty-five 
dollars/* 

"Yah,"  the  others  said,  "He  dont  know  any  such  thing. 
He's  just  talking." 

"Do  you  think  so?"  the  boy  said.  They  continued  to 
jeer  at  him,  but  he  said  nothing  more.  He  leaned  on  the 
rail,  looking  down  at  the  trout  which  he  had  already 
spent,  and  suddenly  the  acrimony,  the  conflict,  was  gone 
from  their  voices,  as  if  to  them  too  it  was  as  though  he 
had  captured  the  fish  and  bought  his  horse  and  wagon, 
they  too  partaking  of  that  adult  trait  of  being  convinced 
of  anything  by  an  assumption  of  silent  superiority.  I  sup' 
pose  that  people,  using  themselves  and  each  other  so 
much  by  words,  are  at  least  consistent  in  attributing  wis- 
dom to  a  still  tongue,  and  for  a  while  I  could  feel  the 
other  two  seeking  swiftly  for  some  means  by  which  to 
cope  with  him,  to  rob  him  of  his  horse  and  wagon. 

"You  couldnt  get  twenty-five  dollars  for  that  pole,'*  the 
first  said.  "I  bet  anything  you  couldnt." 

"He  hasnt  caught  that  trout  yet,"  the  third  said  sud* 
denly,  then  they  both  cried: 

"Yah,  wha'd  I  tell  you?  What's  the  man's  name?  I  dare1 
you  to  tell.  There  aint  any  such  man." 

"Ah,  shut  up,"  the  second  said-  "Look,  Here  he  come,* 
again."  They  leaned  on  the  rail,  motionless,  identical, 
their  poles  slanting  slenderly  in  the  sunlight,  also  identi' 
cal.  The  trout  rose  without  haste,  a  shadow  in  faint  wav* 
ering  increase;  again  the  little  vortex  faded  slowly  down* 
stream.  "Gee,"  the  first  one  murmured. 

"We  dont  try  to  catch  him  anymore,"  he  said.  "'We 
just  watch  Boston  folks  that  come  out  and  try." 


THE     SOUND     AHB     THE     FUUY 

'Is  he  the  only  fish  in  this  pool?" 

"Yes.  He  ran  all  the  others  out.  The  best  place  to  fish 
around  here  is  down  at  the  Eddy." 

"No  it  aint,"  the  second  said.  "It's  better  at  Bigelow's 
Mill  two  to  one."  Then  they  argued  for  a  while  about 
which  was  the  best  fishing  and  then  left  off  all  of  a  sud- 
den to  watch  the  trout  rise  again  and  the  broken  swirl 
of  water  suck  down  a  little  of  the  sky.  I  asked  how  far  it 
Was  to  the  nearest  town.  They  told  me. 

"But  the  closest  car  line  is  that  way,"  the  second  said, 
pointing  back  down  the  road.  "Where  are  you  going?" 

"Nowhere.  Just  walking." 

"You  from  the  college?" 

"Yes.  Are  there  any  factories  in  that  town?" 

"Factories?"  They  looked  at  me. 

"No,"  the  second  said.  "Not  there/'  They  looked  at  my 
clothes.  "You  looking  for  work?" 

"How  about  Bigelow's  Mill?"  the  third  said.  "That's  a 
factory." 

"Factory  my  eye.  He  means  a  sure  enough  factory." 

*X)ne  with  a  whistle,"  I  said.  "I  havent  heard  any  one 
oclock  whistles  yet." 

"Oh/*  the  second  said.  "There's  a  clock  in  the  Unitarian 
steeple.  You  can  find  out  the  time  from  that.  Havent  you 
got  a  watch  on  that  chain?" 

"I  broke  it  this  morning."  I  showed  them  my  watch. 
They  examined  it  gravely. 

"It's  still  running,"  the  second  said.  "What  does  a  watch 
like  that  cost?" 

"It  was  a  present,"  I  said.  "My  father  gave  it  to  me 
when  I  graduated  from  high  school." 

"Are  you  a  Canadian?"  the  third  said.  He  had  red  hair. 

"Canadian?" 


THE     SOTJKD     AND     THE     FTJKY        139 

"He  dont  talk  like  them,"  the  second  said.  "I've  heard 
thein  talk.  He  talks  like  they  do  in  minstrel  shows." 

"Say/'  the  third  said,  "aint  you  afraid  hell  hit  you?" 

"Hit  me?" 

"You  said  he  talks  like  a  coloured  man/' 

"Ah,  dry  up,?>  the  second  said.  "You  can  see  the  steeple 
when  you  get  over  that  hill  there." 

I  thanked  them.  "I  hope  you  have  good  luck.  Only 
dont  catch  that  old  fellow  down  there.  He  deserves  to  be 
let  alone.** 

"Cant  anybody  catch  that  fish/'  the  first  said.  They 
leaned  on  the  rail,  looking  down  into  the  water,  the  three 
poles  like  three  slanting  threads  of  yellow  fire  in  the  sun. 
I  walked  upon  my  shadow,  tramping  it  into  the  dap- 
pled shade  of  trees  again.  The  road  curved,  mounting 
away  from  the  water.  It  crossed  the  hill,  then  descended 
winding,  carrying  the  eye,  the  mind  on  ahead  beneath  a 
still  green  tunnel,  and  the  square  cupola  above  the  trees 
and  the  round  eye  of  the  clock  but  far  enough.  I  sat 
down  at  the  roadside.  The  grass  was  ankle  deep,  myriad. 
The  shadows  on  the  road  were  as  still  as  if  they  had  been 
put  there  with  a  stencil,  with  slanting  pencils  of  sunlight 
But  it  was  only  a  train,  and  after  a  while  it  died  away  be- 
yond the  trees,  the  long  sound,  and  then  I  could  hear  my 
watch  and  the  train  dying  away,  as  though  it  were  run- 
ning through  another  month  or  another  summer  some- 
where, rushing  away  under  the  poised  gull  and  all  things 
rushing.  Except  Gerald.  He  would  be  sort  of  grand  too, 
pulling  in  lonely  state  across  the  noon,  rowing  himself 
right  out  of  noon,  up  the  long  bright  air  like  an  apoth- 
eosis, mounting  into  a  drowsing  infinity  where  only  he 
and  the  gull,  the  one  terrifically  motionless,  the  other  in  a 
steady  and  measured  pull  and  recover  that  partook  of 


14°        THE     SOUN33     AKB     THE     FURY 

inertia  itself,  the  world  ptinily  beneath  their  shadows  on 
the  sun.  Caddy  that  blackguard  that  blackguard  Caddy 

Their  voices  came  over  the  hill,  and  the  three  slender 
poles  like  balanced  threads  of  running  fire.  They  looked 
at  me  passing,  not  slowing. 

"Well,"  I  said,  "I  dont  see  him." 

"We  didnt  try  to  catch  him,"  the  first  said.  '"You  cant 
catch  that  fish/' 

'There's  the  clock/*  the  second  said,  pointing.  "You  can 
tell  the  time  when  you  get  a  little  closer/* 

"Yes/*  I  said,  "AU  right."  I  got  up.  "You  all  going  to 
town?" 

"We're  going  to  the  Eddy  for  chub,"  the  first  said. 

Tou  ca*it  catch  anything  at  the  Eddy,"  the  second 
said. 

**l  guess  you  want  to  go  to  the  mill,  with  a  lot  of  fel- 
lows splashing  and  scaring  all  the  fish  away/* 

"You  cant  catch  any  fish  at  the  Eddy." 

"We  wont  c^tch  none  nowhere  if  we  dont  go  on/*  the 
third  said, 

"I  dont  see  why  you  keep  on  talking  about  the  Eddy/* 
the  second  said.  "You  cant  catch  anything  there/* 

"You  dont  have  t*»  go/'  the  first  said.  "You're  not  tied  to 
me/' 

"Let's  go  to  the  mill  and  go  swimming/*  the  third  said. 

"I'm  going  to  the  Eddy  and  fish/*  the  first  said.  "You 
can  do  as  you  please/' 

"Say,  how  long  has  it  been  since  you  heard  of  any- 
body catching  a  fish  at  tb-e  Eddy?"  the  second  said  to  the 
third. 

"Let's  go  to  the  mill  and  go  swimming/*  the  third  said. 
The  cupola  sank  slowly  beyond  the  trees,  with  the  round 
face  of  the  clock  far  enough  yet.  We  went  on  in  the  dap- 


THE    SOUND    A^TD    THE   :FURY      141 

pled  shade.  We  came  to  an  orchard,  pink  and  white.  It 
was  full  of  bees;  already  we  could  "hear  them. 

"Let's  go  to  the  mill  and  go  swimming/'  the  third  said. 
A  lane  turned  off  beside  the  orchard.  The  third  boy 
slowed  and  halted.  The  first  went  on,  flecks  of  sunlight 
slipping  along  the  pole  across  his  shoulder  and  down  the 
back  of  his  shirt.  "Come  on/'  the  third  said.  The  second 
boy  stopped  too.  Why  must  you  marry  somebody  Caddy 

Do  you  want  me  to  say  it  do  you  think  that  if  I  say  it 
it  wont  be 

"Let's  go  up  to  the  mill,"  he  said.  "Come  on/* 

The  first  boy  went  on.  His  bare  feet  made  no  sound, 
falling  softer  than  leaves  in  the  thin  dust.  In  the  orchard 
the  bees  sounded  like  a  wind  getting  up,  a  sound  caught 
by  a  spell  just  under  crescendo  and  sustained.  The  lane 
went  along  the  wall,  arched  over,  shattered  with  bloom, 
dissolving  into  trees.  Sunlight  slanted  into  it,  sparse  and 
eager.  Yellow  butterflies  flickered  along  the  shade  like 
flecks  of  sun. 

"What  do  you  want  to  go  to  the  Eddy  for?"  the  second 
boy  said.  "You  can  fish  at  the  mill  if  you  want  to." 

"Ah,  let  him  go,"  the  third  said.  They  looked  after  the 
first  boy.  Sunlight  slid  patchily  across  his  walking  shoul- 
ders, glinting  along  the  pole  like  yellow  ants. 

"Kenny,"  the  second  said.  Say  it  to  Father  will  you  1 
will  am  my  fathers  Progenitive  I  invented  him  created  I 
him  Say  it  to  him  it  will  not  be  for  he  will  say  I  was  not 
and  then  you  and  I  since  philoprogenitive 

"Ah,  come  on/'  the  boy  said,  "They're  already  in."  They 
looked  after  the  first  boy.  "Yah,"  they  said  suddenly,  "go 
on  then,  mamma's  boy.  If  he  goes  swimming  he'll  get  his 
head  wet  and  then  hell  get  a  licking."  They  turned  into 
the  lane  and  went  on,  the  yellow  butterflies  slanting  about 
them  along  the  shade. 


*42        THE     SOUND     A3STD     THE     FUBY 

II  is  because  there  is  nothing  else  I  believe  there  is 
something  else  but  there  may  not  be  and  then  I  You  toill 
find  that  even  injustice  is  scarcely  worthy  of  what  you  be- 
lieve yourself  to  be  He  paid  me  no  attention,  his  jaw  set 
In  profile,  his  face  turned  a  little  away  beneath  his  broken 
hat. 

"Why  dont  you  go  swimming  with  them?"  I  said,  that 
blackguard  Caddy 

Were  yon  trying  to  pick  a  fight  with  him  were  you 

A  liar  and  a  scoundrel  Caddy  was  dropped  from  his 
club  for  cheating  at  cards  got  sent  to  Coventry  caught 
cheating  at  midterm  exams  and  expelled 

Well  what  about  it  I'm  not  going  to  play  cards  with 

"Do  you  like  fishing  better  than  swimming?"  I  said. 
The  sound  of  the  bees  diminished,  sustained  yet,  as 
though  instead  of  sinking  into  silence,  silence  merely  in- 
creased between  us,  as  water  rises.  The  road  curved  again 
and  became  a  street  between  shady  lawns  with  white 
houses.  Caddy  that  blackguard  can  you  think  of  Benjy 
and  Father  and  do  it  not  of  me 

What  else  can  I  think  about  what  else  have  I  thought 
about  The  boy  turned  from  the  street.  He  climbed  a 
picket  fence  without  looking  back  and  crossed  the  lawn 
to  a  tree  and  laid  the  pole  down  and  climbed  into  the 
fork  of  the  tree  and  sat  there,  his  back  to  the  road  and 
the  dappled  sun  motionless  at  last  upon  his  white  shirt 
Else  have  I  thought  about  I  cant  even  cry  I  died  last  year 
I  told  you  I  had  but  I  didnt  know  then  wJiat  I  meant  I 
didnt  know  what  I  was  saying  Some  days  in  late  August 
at  home  are  like  this,  the  air  thin  and  eager  like  this, 
with  something  in  it  sad  and  nostalgic  and  familiar.  Man 
the  sum  of  his  climatic  experiences  Father  said,  Man  the 
sum  of  what  have  you.  A  problem  in  impure  properties 


THE     SOUND     AltfD     THE     FURY        143 

carried  tediously  to  an  unvarying  nil:  stalemate  of  dust 
and  desire.  But  now  I  know  fm  dead  I  tett  you 

Then  why  must  you  listen  we  can  go  away  you  and 
Benjy  and  me  where  nobody  knows  us  where  The  buggy 
was  drawn  by  a  white  horse,  his  feet  clopping  in  the  thin 
dust;  spidery  wheels  chattering  thin  and  dry,  moving  up- 
hill beneath  a  rippling  shawl  of  leaves.  Elm.  No:  eUum. 
Ellum. 

On  what  on  your  school  money  the  money  they  sold 
the  pasture  for  so  you  could  go  to  Harvard  dont  you  see 
you've  got  to  -finish  now  if  you  dont  finish  he'll  have  noth- 
ing 

Sold  the  pasture  His  white  shirt  was  motionless  in.  the 
fork,  in  the  flickering  shade.  The  wheels  were  spidery, 
Beneath  the  sag  of  the  buggy  the  hooves  neatly  rapid 
like  the  motions  of  a  lady  doing  embroidery,  diminishing 
without  progress  like  a  figure  on  a  treadmill  being  drawn 
rapidly  offstage.  The  street  turned  again.  I  could  see  the 
white  cupola,  the  round  stupid  assertion  of  the  clock 
Sold  the  pasture 

Father  will  be  dead  in  a  year  they  say  if  he  doemt  stop 
drinking  and  he  wont  stop  he  cant  stop  xince  I  since  last 
summer  and  then  they'll  send  Benjy  to  Jackson  I  cant  cry 
I  cant  even  cry  one  minute  she  was  standing  in  the  door 
the  next  minute  he  was  pulling  at  her  dress  and  bellowing 
his  voice  hammered  back  and  forth  between  the  walls  in 
waves  and  she  shrinking  against  the  wall  getting  smaller 
and  smaller  with  her  white  face  her  eyes  like  thumbs  dug 
into  it  until  he  pushed  her  out  of  the  room  his  voice  ham- 
mering back  and  forth  as  though  its  own  momentum 
would  not  let  it  stop  as  though  there  were  no  place  for  it 
hi  silence  bellowing 

When  you  opened  the  door  a  bell  tinkled,  but  just  once* 


f44        THE     SCIZJND     AND     THE     FUEY 

high  and  clear  and  small  in  the  neat  obscurity  above  the 
door,  as  though  it  were  gauged  and  tempered  to  make 
that  single  clear  small  sound  so  as  not  to  wear  the  bell 
out  nor  to  require  the  expenditure  of  too  much  silence  in 
restoring  it  when  the  door  opened  upon  the  recent  warn? 
scent  of  baking;  a  little  dirty  child  with  eyes  like  a  toy 
bear's  and  two  patent-leather  pig-tails. 

"Hello,  sister."  Her  face  was  like  a  cup  of  milk  dashed 
with  coffee  in  the  sweet  warm  emptiness.  "Anybody 
here?" 

But  she  merely  watched  me  until  a  door  opened  and 
the  lady  came.  Above  the  counter  where  the  ranks  of 
crisp  shapes  behind  the  glass  her  neat  grey  face  her 
hair  tight  and  sparse  from  her  neat  grey  skull,  spectacles 
in  neat  grey  rims  riding  approaching  like  something  on  a 
wire,  like  a  cash  box  in  a  store.  She  looked  like  a  librarian. 
Something  among  dusty  shelves  of  ordered  certitudes 
long  divorced  from  reality,  desiccating  peacefully,  as  if 
a  breath  of  that  air  which  sees  injustice  done 

"Two  of  these,  please,  ma'am." 

From  under  the  counter  she  produced  a  square  cut 
from  a  newspaper  and  laid  it  on  the  counter  and  lifted 
the  two  buns  out  The  little  girl  watched  them  with  still 
and  unwinking  eyes  like  two  currants  floating  motionless 
in  a  cup  of  weak  coffee  Land  of  the  kike  home  of  the 
wop.  Watching  the  bread,  the  neat  grey  hands,  a  broad 
gold  band  on  the  left  forefinger,  knuckled  there  by  a  blue 
knuckle. 

"Do  you  do  your  own  baking,  ma'am?" 

"Sir?"  she  said.  Like  that.  Sir?  Like  on  the  stage  Sir? 
**Five  cents.  Was  there  anything  else?" 

"No,  ma'am.  Not  for  me.  This  lady  wants  something," 
She  was  not  tall  enough  to  see  over  the  case,  so  she  went 


THE     SOUXD     AND     THE     FURY         145 

to  the  end  of  the  counter  and  looked  at  the  little  girl 

"Did  you  bring  her  in  here?" 

"No,  ma'am.  She  was  here  when  I  came." 

"You  little  wretch,"  she  said.  She  came  out  around 
the  counter,  but  she  didnt  touch  the  little  girl.  "Have  jot 
got  anything  in  your  pockets?" 

"She  hasnt  got  any  pockets,"  I  said,  "She  wasnt  doing 
anything.  She  was  standing  here,  waiting  for  you." 

"Why  didnt  the  bell  ring,  then?"  She  gkred  at  me.  She 
just  needed  a  bunch  of  switches,  a  blackboard  behind 
her  2  x  2  e  5.  "Shell  hide  it  under  her  dress  and  a 
body'd  never  know  it.  You,  child.  How'd  you  get  in  here?" 

The  little  girl  said  nothing.  She  looked  at  the  woman, 
then  she  gave  me  a  flying  black  glance  and  looked  at 
the  woman  again,  "Them  foreigners,"  the  woman  said. 
"How'd  she  get  in  without  the  bell  ringing?" 

"She  came  in  when  I  opened  the  door,"  I  said.  "It  rang 
once  for  both  of  us.  She  couldnt  reach  anything  from 
here,  anyway.  Besides,  I  dont  think  she  would.  Would 
you,  sister?"  The  little  girl  looked  at  me,  secretive,  con- 
templative. "What  do  you  want?  bread?" 

She  extended  her  fist.  It  uncurled  upon  a  nickel,  moist 
and  dirty,  moist  dirt  ridged  into  her  flesh.  The  coin  was 
damp  and  warm.  I  could  smell  it,  faintly  metallic. 

"Have  you  got  a  five  cent  loaf,  please,  ma'am?" 

From  beneath  the  counter  she  produced  a  square  cut 
from  a  newspaper  sheet  and  laid  it  on  the  counter  and 
wrapped  a  loaf  into  it.  I  laid  the  coin  and  another  one 
on  the  counter.  "And  another  one  of  those  buns,  please, 
ma'am." 

She  took  another  bun  from  the  case-  "Give  me  that 
parcel,"  she  said.  I  gave  it  to  her  and  she  unwrapped  it 
and  put  the  third  bun  in  and  wrapped  it  and  took  the 


THE     SOUND     AXD     THE     FURY 

coins  and  found  two  coppers  in  her  apron  and  gave  them 
to  me.  I  handed  them  to  the  little  girl.  Her  fingers  closed 
about  them,  damp  and  hot,  like  worms. 

"You  going  to  give  her  that  bun?"  the  woman  said. 

'Tfessum/'  I  said.  "I  expect  your  cooking  smells  as  good 
to  her  as  it  does  to  me/* 

I  took  up  the  two  packages  and  gave  the  bread  to  the 
little  girl,  the  woman  all  iron-grey  behind  the  counter, 
watching  us  with  cold  certitude.  "You  wait  a  minute," 
she  said.  She  went  to  the  rear.  The  door  opened  again 
and  closed.  The  little  girl  watched  me,  holding  the  bread 
against  her  dirty-dress. 

^What's  your  name?"  I  said.  She  quit  looking  at  me, 
but  she  was  still  motionless.  She  didnt  even  seem  to 
breathe.  The  woman  returned.  She  had  a  funny  looking 
thing  in  her  hand.  She  carried  it  sort  of  like  it  might 
have  been  a  dead  pet  rat 

"Here,"  she  said.  The  child  looked  at  her.  Take  it" 
the  woman  said,  jabbing  it  at  the  little  girl.  "It  just  looks 
peculiar.  I  calculate  you  wont  know  the  difference  when 
you  eat  it.  Here.  I  cant  stand  here  all  day."  The  child 
took  it,  still  watching  her.  The  woman  rubbed  her  hands 
on  her  apron.  "I  got  to  have  that  bell  fixed,"  she  said. 
She  went  to  the  door  and  jerked  it  open.  The  little  bell 
tinkled  once,  faint  and  clear  and  invisible.  We  moved 
toward  the  door  and  the  woman's  peering  back. 

"Thank  you  for  the  cake,"  I  said. 

"Them  foreigners,"  she  said,  staring  up  into  the  obscu- 
rity where  the  bell  tinkled.  "Take  my  advice  and  stay 
clear  of  them,  young  man." 

"Yessum,"  I  said.  "Come  on,  sister."  We  went  out 
"Thank  you,  ma'am." 

She  swung  the  door  to,  then  jerked  it  open  again,  mak- 


THE     SOUKD     AKB     THE     FUHY        14? 

ing  the  bell  give  forth  its  single  small  note.  "Foreigners," 
she  said,  peering  up  at  the  bell. 

We  went  on.  'Well/'  I  said,  "How  about  some  ic$ 
cream?"  She  was  eating  the  gnarled  cake.  "Do  you  like 
ice  cream?"  She  gave  me  a  black  still  look,  chewing. 
"Come  on." 

We  came  to  the  drugstore  and  had  some  ice  cream. 
She  wouldn't  put  the  loaf  down.  "Why  not  put  it  down 
so  you  can  eat  better?"  I  said,  offering  to  take  it.  But  she 
held  to  it,  chewing  the  ice  cream  like  it  was  taffy.  The 
bitten  cake  lay  on  the  table.  She  ate  the  ice  cream  stead- 
ily, then  she  fell  to  on  the  cake  again,  looking  about  at 
the  showcases.  I  finished  mine  and  we  went  out. 

"Which  way  do  you  live?"  I  said. 

A  buggy,  the  one  with  the  horse  it  was.  Only  Doc  Pea- 
body  is  fat.  Three  hundred  pounds.  You  ride  with  him  on 
the  uphill  side,  holding  on.  Children.  Walking  easier  than 
holding  uphill.  Seen  the  doctor  yet  have  you  seen  Caddy 

I  dont  have  to  I  cant  ask  now  afterward  it  will  be 
all  right  it  wont  matter 

Because  women  so  delicate  so  mysterious  Father  said. 
Delicate  equilibrium  of  periodical  filth  between  two 
moons  balanced.  Moons  he  said  full  and  yellow  as  har- 
vest moons  her  hips  thighs.  Outside  outside  of  them  al- 
ways but.  Yellow.  Feetsoles  with  walking  like.  Then 
know  that  some  man  that  all  those  mysterious  and  im- 
perious concealed.  With  all  that  inside  of  them  shapes  an 
outward  suavity  waiting  for  a  touch  to.  Liquid  putre- 
faction like  drowned  things  floating  like  pale  rubber 
flabbily  filled  getting  the  odour  of  honeysuckle  all  mixed 
up. 

"You'd  better  take  your  bread  on  home,  hadnt  you?" 

She  looked  at  me.  She  chewed  quietly  and  steadily;  at 


I4&        THE     SOTJHD     AND     THE 

regular  Intervals  a  small  distension  passed  smoothly  down 
"her  throat.  I  opened  my  package  and  gave  her  one  of 
the  buns.  "Goodbye/*  I  said. 

I  went  on.  Then  I  looked  back.  She  was  behind  me, 
<sDo  you  live  down  this  way?"  She  said  nothing.  She 
Walked  beside  me,  under  my  elbow  sort  of,  eating.  We 
Went  on.  It  was  quiet,  hardly  anyone  about  getting  the 
odour  of  "honeysuckle  all  mixed  She  would  have  told  me 
not  to  let  me  sit  there  on  the  steps  heating  her  door  ttoi- 
light  slamming  hearing  Benjy  still  crying  Supper  she 
would  have  to  come  down  then  getting  honeysuckle  alt 
mixed  up  in  it  We  reached  the  corner. 

"Well,  IVe  got  to  go  down  this  way,"  I  said,  "Good- 
bye." She  stopped  too.  She  swallowed  the  last  of  the  cake, 
then  she  began  on  the  bun,  watching  me  across  it.  "Good* 
bye/'  I  said.  I  turned  into  the  street  and  went  on,  but  I 
Went  to  the  next  comer  before  I  stopped. 

*Which  way  do  you  live?"  I  said.  "This  way?"  I  pointed 
down  the  street  She  just  looked  at  me.  "Do  you  live  over 
that  way?  I  bet  you  live  close  to  the  station,  where  the 
trains  are.  Dont  you?"  She  just  looked  at  me,  serene  and 
secret  and  chewing.  The  street  was  empty  both  ways, 
with  quiet  lawns  and  houses  neat  among  the  trees,  but 
no  one  at  all  except  back  there.  We  turned  and  went 
back.  Two  men  sat  in  chairs  in  front  of  a  store. 

TDo  you  all  know  this  little  girl?  She  sort  of  took  up 
with  me  and  I  cant  find  where  she  lives." 

They  quit  looking  at  me  and  looked  at  her, 

"Must  be  one  of  them  new  Italian  families,"  one  said, 
He  wore  a  rusty  frock  coat  "IVe  seen  her  before.  Whaf  s 
your  name,  little  girl?"  She  looked  at  them  blackly  for 
awhile,  her  jaws  moving  steadily.  She  swallowed  without 
ceasing  to  chew. 

"Maybe  she  cant  speak  English,"  the  other  said. 


THE      SOU3STD      AHD     THE      FURY         149 

"They  sent  her  after  bread,"  I  said.  "She  must  be  abla 
to  speak  something." 

"What's  your  pa  s  name?"  the  first  said.  "Pete?  Joe? 
name  John  huh?"  She  took  another  bite  from  the  bun. 

"What  must  I  do  with  her?"  I  said.  "She  just  follow* 
me.  I've  got  to  get  back  to  Boston." 

"You  from  the  college?" 

"Yes,  sir.  And  IVe  got  to  get  on  back" 

"You  might  go  up  the  street  and  turn  her  over  to  Anse. 
Hell  be  up  at  the  livery  stable.  The  marshal!/' 

"I  reckon  that's  what  111  have  to  do/'  1  said.  "IVe  got 
to  do  something  with  her.  Much  obliged.  Come  on,  sister." 

We  went  up  the  street,  on  the  shady  side,  where  the 
shadow  of  the  broken  facade  blotted  slowly  across  the 
road.  We  came  to  the  livery  stable.  The  marshall  wasni 
there.  A  man  sitting  in  a  chair  tilted  in  the  broad  low 
door,  where  a  dark  cool  breeze  smelling  of  ammonia 
blew  among  the  ranked  stalls,  said  to  look  at  the  post- 
office.  He  didn't  know  her  either. 

"Them  furriners.  I  cant  tell  one  from  another.  You 
might  take  her  across  the  tracks  where  they  live,  and 
maybe  somebodyTl  claim  her." 

We  went  to  the  postoffice.  It  was  back  down  the  street 
The  man  in  the  frock  coat  was  opening  a  newspaper. 

"Anse  just  drove  out  of  town,"  he  said.  "I  guess  you'd 
better  go  down  past  the  station  and  walk  past  them 
houses  by  the  river.  Somebody  there'll  know  her." 

"I  guess  III  have  to,"  I  said.  "Come  on,  sister."  She 
pushed  the  last  piece  of  the  bun  into  her  mouth  and  swal- 
lowed it.  "Want  another?"  I  said.  She  looked  at  me,  chew* 
ing,  her  eyes  black  and  unwinking  and  friendly.  I  took 
the  other  two  buns  out  and  gave  her  one  and  bit  into  the 
other.  I  asked  a  man  where  the  station  was  and  he 
showed  me.  "Come  on,  sister/' 


I  JO   THE  SOUND  AND  THE  FURY 

We  reached  the  station  and  crossed  the  tracks,  where 
the  river  was.  A  bridge  crossed  it,  and  a  street  of  jum- 
bled frame  houses  followed  the  river,  backed  onto  it.  A 
shabby  street,  but  with  an  air  heterogeneous  and  vivid 
too.  In  the  center  of  an  untrimmed  plot  enclosed  by  a 
fence  of  gaping  and  broken  pickets  stood  an  ancient  lop- 
sided surrey  and  a  weathered  house  from  an  upper  win- 
dow of  which  hung  a  garment  of  vivid  pink. 

"Does  that  look  like  your  house?"  I  said.  She  looked 
at  me  over  the  bun.  "This  one?"  I  said,  pointing.  She  just 
chewed,  but  it  seemed  to  me  that  I  discerned  something 
affirmative,  acquiescent  even  if  it  wasn't  eager,  in  her  air. 
'This  one?"  I  said.  "Come  on,  then."  I  entered  the  broken 
gate.  I  looked  back  at  her.  "Here?"  I  said.  "This  look  like 
your  house?'* 

She  nodded  her  head  rapidly,  looking  at  me,  gnawing 
into  the  damp  halfmoon  of  the  bread.  We  went  on.  A 
walk  of  broken  random  flags,  speared  by  fresh  coarse 
blades  of  grass,  led  to  the  broken  stoop.  There  was  no 
movement  about  the  house  at  all,  and  the  pink  garment 
hanging  in  no  wind  from  the  upper  window.  There  was 
a  bell  pull  with  a  porcelain  knob,  attached  to  about  six 
feet  of  wire  when  I  stopped  pulling  and  knocked.  The 
little  girl  had  the  crust  edgeways  in  her  chewing -mouth. 

A  woman  opened  the  door.  She  looked  at  me,  then  she 
spoke  rapidly  to  the  little  girl  in  Italian,  with  a  rising  in- 
flection, then  a  pause,  interrogatory.  She  spoke  to  her 
again,  the  little  girl  looking  at  her  across  the  end  of  the 
crust,  pushing  it  into  her  mouth  with  a  dirty  hand. 

"She  says  she  lives  here,"  I  said.  "I  met  her  down  town. 
Is  this  your  bread?" 

"No  spika,"  the  woman  said.  She  spoke  to  the  little  girl 
again.  The  Httle  girl  just  looked  at  her. 


THE     SOUND     AXB     TH&     FURY 

"No  live  here?"  I  said.  I  pointed  to  the  girl,  then  at  hei; 
then  at  the  door.  The  woman  shook  her  head.  She  spok& 
rapidly.  She  came  to  the  edge  of  the  porch  and  pointed 
down  the  road,  speaking. 

I  nodded  violently  too.  "You  come  show?"  I  said.  I  took 
her  arm,  waving  my  other  hand  toward  the  road.  She 
spoke  swiftly,  pointing.  **You  come  show/'  I  said,  trying 
to  lead  her  down  the  steps. 

"Si,  si,"  she  said,  holding  back,  showing  me  whatever 
it  was.  I  nodded  again. 

'Thanks.  Thanks.  Thanks/'  I  went  down  the  steps  and 
walked  toward  the  gate,  not  running,  but  pretty  fast.  I 
.reached  the  gate  and  stopped  and  looked  at  her  for  a 
while.  The  crust  was  gone  now,  and  she  looked  at  me 
with  her  black,  friendly  stare.  The  woman  stood  on  the 
stoop,  watching  us. 

"Come  on,  then/'  I  said.  "Well  have  to  find  the  right 
one  sooner  or  later/* 

She  moved  along  just  under  my  elbow.  We  went  on. 
The  houses  all  seemed  empty.  Not  a  soul  in  sight  A  sort 
of  breathlessness  that  empty  houses  have.  Yet  they 
couldnt  all  be  empty.  All  the  different  rooms,  if  you 
could  just  slice  the  walls  away  all  of  a  sudden  Madam, 
your  daughter,  if  you  please.  No.  Madam,  for  God's  **ke. 
your  daughter.  She  moved  along  just  under  my  elbow, 
her  shiny  tight  pigtails,  and  then  the  last  house  played  out 
and  the  road  curved  out  of  sight  beyond  a  wall,  following 
the  river.  The  woman  was  emerging  from  the  broken 
gate,  with  a  shawl  over  her  head  and  clutched  under  her 
chin.  The  road  curved  on,  empty.  I  found  a  coin  and 
gave  it  to  the  little  girl.  A  quarter.  "Goodbye,  sister,"  I 
said.  Then  I  ran. 

I  ran  fast,  not  looking  back.  Just  before  the  road  curved 


THK     SOUND     AND     THE     FIIEY 

away  I  looked  back.  She  stood  In  the  road,  a  small  figure 
clasping  the  loaf  of  bread  to  her  filthy  little  dress,  her 
eyes  still  and  bkck  and  unwinking*  I  ran  on- 

A  lane  turned  from  the  road.  I  entered  it  and  after  a 
while  I  slowed  to  a  fast  wale.  The  lane  went  between 
back  premises — unpainted  houses  with  more  of  those  gay 
snd  startling  coloured  garments  on  lines,  a  barn  broken- 
backed,  decaying  quietly  among  rank  orchard  trees, 
unpraned  and  weedchoked,  pink  and  white  and  murmur- 
ous with  sunlight  and  with  bees.  I  looked  back.  The  en- 
trance to  the  lane  was  empty.  I  slowed  still  more,  my 
shadow  pacing  me,  dragging  its  head  through  the  weeds 
that  hid  the  fence. 

The  lane  went  back  to  a  barred  gate,  became  defunc- 
tive  in  grass,  a  mere  path  scarred  quietly  into  new  grass. 
I  climbed  the  gate  into  a  woodlot  and  crossed  it  and 
came  to  another  wall  and  followed  that  one,  my  shadow 
behind  me  now.  There  were  vines  and  creepers  where 
at  home  would  be  honeysuckle.  Coming  and  coming  es- 
pecially in  the  dusk  when  it  rained,  getting  honeysuckle 
all  mixed  up  in  it  as  though  it  were  not  enough  without 
that,  not  unbearable  enough.  What  did  you  let  him  for 
kiss  kiss 

I  didnt  let  him  I  made  him  watching  me  getting  mad 
What  do  you  think  of  that?  Red  print  of  my  hand  coming 
up  through  her  face  like  turning  a  light  on  under  your 
hand  her  eyes  going  bright 

It's  not  for  kissing  I  slapped  you.  GirEs  elbows  at  fif~ 
feen  Father  said  you  swallow  like  you  had  a  -fishbone  in 
your  throat  what's  the  matter  with  you  and  Caddy  across 
the  table  not  to  look  at  me.  It's  for  letting  it  be  some  darn 
town  squirt  I  slapped  you  you  will  will  you  now  I  guess 
you  say  calf  rope.  My  red  hand  coming  up  out  of  her 
face.  What  do  you  think  of  that  scouring  her  head  into 


THE     SOU3STB     A1STD     THE     FIT-BY         153 

the.  Grass  sticks  crisscrossed  into  the  flesh  tingling  scoui^ 
mg  her  head.  Say  calf  rope  say  it 

1  didnt  kiss  a  dirty  girl  like  Natalie  anyway  The  wall 
went  into  shadow,  and  then  my  shadow,  I  had  tricked  it 
again.  I  had  forgot  about  the  river  curving  along  the 
road.  I  climbed  the  wall.  And  then  she  watched  me  jump 
down,  holding  the  loaf  against  her  dress. 

I  stood  in  the  weeds  and  we  looked  at  one  another  for 
a  while. 

"Why  didnt  you  tell  me  you  lived  out  this  way,  sister?** 
Ihe  loaf  was  wearing  slowly  out  of  the  paper;  already  it 
needed  a  new  one.  "Well,  come  on  then  and  show  me  the 
house/*  not  a  dirty  girl  like  Natalie.  It  was  raining  we 
could  hear  it  on  the  roof,  sighing  through  the  high  sweet 
emptiness  of  the  barn. 

There?  touching  her 

Not  there 

There?  not  raining  hard  but  we  couldnt  hear  anything 
Tint  tine  roof  and  as  if  it  was  my  blood  or  her  blood 

She  pushed  me  down  the  ladder  and  ran  off  and  lefi 
me  Caddy  did 

Was  it  there  it  hurt  you  when  Caddy  did  ran  of  was  U 
there 

Oh  She  walked  just  under  my  elbow,  the  top  of  hex 
patent  leather  head,  the  loaf  fraying  out  of  the  news* 
paper. 

"If  you  dont  get  home  pretty  soon  you're  going  to  wear 
that  loaf  out.  And  then  what* 11  your  mamma  say?"  I  bet 
I  can  lift  you  up 

You  cant  I'm  too  heavy 

Did  Caddy  go  away  did  she  go  to  the  house  you  can* 
see  the  barn  from  our  house  did  you  ever  try  to  see  th0 
barn  from 

It  was  her  fault  she  pushed  me  she  ran  away 


154        THE     SOTflSFB     A1STB     THE     FT7BY 

I  can  /£/£  t/ow  up  see  how  I  can 

oh  her  blood  or  my  blood  Oh  We  went  on  in  the  thin 
dust,  our  feet  silent  as  rubber  in  the  thin  dust  where  pen- 
cils of  sun  slanted  in  the  trees.  And  I  could  feel  water 
again  running  swift  and  peaceful  in  the  secret  shade. 

"You  live  a  long  way,  dont  you.  You're  mighty  smart  to 
go  this  far  to  town  by  yourself ."  It's  like  dancing  sitting 
down  did  you  ever  dance  sitting  down?  We  could  hear 
the  rain,  a  rat  in  the  crib,  the  empty  barn  vacant  with 
horses.  Haw  do  you  hold  to  dance  do  you  hold  tike  this 

Oh 

I  used  to  hold  like  this  you  thought  I  wasnt  strong 
Enough  didnt  you 

Oh  Oh  Oh  Oh 

I  hold  to  use  like  this  I  mean  did  you  hear  what  I  said 
I  said 

oh  oh  oh  oh 

The  road  went  on,  still  and  empty,  the  sun  slanting 
more  and  more.  Her  stiff  little  pigtails  were  bound  at  the 
tips  with  bits  of  crimson  cloth.  A  corner  of  the  wrapping 
flapped  a  little  as  she  walked,  the  nose  of  the  loaf  naked. 
I  stopped. 

TLook  here.  Do  you  live  down  this  road?  We  havent 
passed  a  house  in  a  mile,  almost/' 

She  looked  at  me,  black  and  secret  and  friendly. 

'Where  do  you  live,  sister?  Dont  you  live  back  there  in 
town?" 

There  was  a  bird  somewhere  in  the  woods,  beyond  the 
broken  and  infrequent  slanting  of  sunlight 

"Your  papa's  going  to  be  worried  about  you.  Dont  you 
reckon  you'll  get  a  whipping  for  not  coming  straight  home 
with  that  bread?" 

The  bird  whistled  again,  invisible,  a  sound  meaning- 
less and  profound,  inflexionless,  ceasing  as  though  cut  off 


THE     SOUHD     AND     THE     FtTAT 

with  the  blow  of  a  knife,  and  again,  and  that  sense  of 
water  sv^ift  and  peaceful  above  secret  places,  felt,  not 
seen  not  heard. 

"Oh,  hell,  sister."  About  half  the  paper  hung  limp. 
'That's  not  doing  any  good  now."  I  tore  it  off  and 
dropped  it  beside  the  road.  *fcCome  on.  Well  have  to  go 
back  to  town.  We'll  go  back  along  the  river.'* 

We  left  the  road.  Among  the  moss  little  pale  flowers 
grew,  and  the  sense  of  water  mute  and  unseen.  I  hold  to 
use  like  this  I  mean  I  use  to  hold  She  stood  in  the  door 
looking  at  us  her  hands  on  her  hips 

You  pushed  me  it  was  your  fault  it  hurt  me  too 

We  were  dancing  sitting  down  I  bet  Caddy  cant  dance 
sitting  down 

Stop  tliat  stop  that 

i  was  just  brushing  the  trash  of  the  back  of  your  dress 

You  keep  your  nasty  old  hands  off  of  me  it  was  youi 
fault  you  pushed  me  down  I'm  mad  at  you 

I  dont  care  she  looked  at  us  stay  -mad  she  went  away 
We  began  to  hear  the  shouts,  the  splashings;  I  saw  a 
brown  body  gleam  for  an  instant. 

Stay  mad.  My  shirt  was  getting  wet  and  my  Jwir< 
Across  the  roof  hearing  the  roof  loud  now  I  could  see 
Natalie  going  through  the  garden  among  the  rain.  Get 
wet  I  hope  you  catch  pneumonia  go  on  home  Gowface.  I 
jumped  hard  as  I  could  into  the  hogwallow  and  mud  yel- 
lowed up  to  my  waist  stinking  I  kept  on  plunging  until  1 
fell  down  and  rolled  over  in  it  "Hear  them  in  swimming, 
sister?  I  wouldn't  mind  doing  that  myself."  If  I  had  time. 
When  I  have  time.  I  could  near  my  watch,  mud  was 
warmer  than  the  rain  it  smeUed  awful.  She  had  her  hack 
turned  I  went  around  in  front  of  her.  You  know  what  1 
was  doing?  She  turned  her  back  I  went  around  in  front' 
of  her  the  rain  creeping  into  the  mud  -flatting  her 


THE     SOUND     AND     THE      F  U  ft  X" 

through  her  dress  it  smelled  horrible.  I  was  hugging  her 
tkafs  what  I  was  doing.  She  turned  her  back  1  went 
around  in  front  of  her.  I  was  hugging  her  I  tell  you. 

1  dont  give  a  damn  what  you  were  doing 

You  dont  you  dont  Til  make  you  Til  make  you  give  a 
damn.  She  hit  my  hands  away  I  smeared  mud  on  her  with 
the  other  hand  I  couldn't  feel  the  wet  smacking  of  her 
hand  I  wiped  mud  from  my  legs  smeared  it  on  her  wet 
hard  turning  body  hearing  her  fingers  going  into  my  face 
but  I  couldnt  feel  it  even  when  the  rain  began  to  taste 
sweet  on  my  lips 

They  saw  us  from  the  water  first,  heads  and  shoulders. 
They  yelled  and  one  rose  squatting  and  sprang  among 
them.  They  looked  like  beavers,  the  water  lipping  about 
their  chins,  yelling. 

"Take  that  girl  away!  What  did  you  want  to  bring  a 
girl  here  for?  Go  on  away!" 

"She  wont  hurt  you.  We  just  want  to  watch  you  for  a 
while." 

They  squatted  in  the  water.  Their  heads  drew  into  a 
clump,  watching  us,  then  they  broke  and  rushed  toward 
us,  hurling  water  with  their  hands.  We  moved  quick. 

"Look  out,  boys;  she  wont  hurt  you." 

"Go  on  away,  Harvard!'"  It  was  the  second  boy,  the  one 
that  thought  the  horse  and  wagon  back  there  at  the 
bridge.  "Splash  them,  fellows!" 

"Let's  get  out  and  throw  them  in,"  another  said.  *T  aint 
afraid  of  any  girl." 

"Splash  them!  Splash  them!"  They  rushed  toward  us» 
hurling  water.  We  moved  back.  "Go  on  away!"  they 
yelled.  "Go  on  away!" 

We  went  away.  They  huddled  just  under  the  bank, 
their  slick  heads  in  a  row  against  the  bright  water.  We 
Went  on.  "That's  not  for  us,  is  it."  The  sun  slanted  through 


THE  SOUND  AHB  THE  FURY    1 57 

to  tike  moss  here  and  there,  leveller.  "Poor  kid,  you're  just 
a  girl."  Little  flowers  grew  among  the  moss,  littler  than  I 
had  ever  seen.  *Tou*re  just  a  girl.  Poor  kid."  There  was  a 
path,  curving  along  beside  the  water.  Then  the  water  was 
still  again,  dark  and  still  and  swift.  "Nothing  but  a  girL 
Poor  sister."  We  lay  in  the  wet  grass  panting  the  rain  like 
cold  shot  on  my  back.  Do  you  care  now  do  you  do  you 

My  Lord  we  sure  are  in  a  mess  get  up.  Where  the  rain 
touched  my  forehead  it  began  to  smart  my  hand  came 
red  away  streaking  off  pink  in  the  rain.  Does  it  hurt 

Of  course  it  does  what  do  you  reckon 

I  tried  to  scratch  your  eyes  out  my  Lord  we  sure  do 
stink  we  better  try  to  wash  it  off  in  the  branch  "There's 
town  again,  sister.  You'll  have  to  go  home  now.  I've  got 
to  get  back  to  school.  Look  how  late  it's  getting.  You'll 
go  home  now,  wont  you?"  But  she  just  looked  at  me  with 
her  black,  secret,  friendly  gaze,  the  half-naked  loaf 
clutched  to  her  breast.  "It's  wet.  I  thought  we  jumped 
back  in  time."  I  took  my  handkerchief  and  tried  to  wipe 
the  loaf,  but  the  crust  began  to  come  off,  so  I  stopped* 
"We'll  just  have  to  let  it  dry  itself.  Hold  it  like  this."  She 
held  it  like  that.  It  looked  land  of  like  rats  had  been  eat- 
ing it  now.  and  the  water  building  and  building  up  the 
squatting  back  the  sloughed  mud  stinking  surfaceward 
pocking  the  pattering  surface  like  grease  on  a  hot  stove.  1 
told  you  Td  make  you 

I  dont  give  a  goddam  what  you  do 

Then  we  heard  the  running  and  we  stopped  and  looked 
back  and  saw  him  coming  up  the  path  running,  the  level 
shadows  flicking  upon  his  legs. 

"He's  in  a  hurry.  We'd — "  then  I  saw  another  man,  an 
oldish  man  running  heavily,  clutching  a  stick,  and  a  boy 
naked  from  the  waist  up,  clutching  his  pants  as  he  ran. 

'There's  Julio,**  the  little  girl  said*  and  then  I  saw  his 


iSS        THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FTJXY 

Italian  face  and  his  eyes  as  lie  sprang  upon  me.  We  went 
down.  His  hands  were  jabbing  at  my  face  and  he  was 
saying  something  and  trying  to  bite  me,  I  reckon,  and 
then  they  hauled  him  off  and  held  him  heaving  and 
thrashing  and  yelling  and  they  held  his  arms  and  he  tried 
to  kick  me  until  they  dragged  him  back.  The  little  girl 
was  howling,  holding  the  loaf  in  both  arms.  The  half- 
naked  boy  was  darting  and  jumping  up  and  down,  clutch- 
ing his  trousers  and  someone  pulled  me  up  in  time  to 
see  another  stark  naked  figure  come  around  the  tranquil 
bend  in  the  path  running  and  change  direction  in  mid- 
stride  and  leap  into  the  woods,  a  couple  of  garments 
rigid  as  boards  behind  it.  Julio  still  struggled.  The  man 
who  had  pulled  me  up  said,  "Whoa,  now.  We  got  you." 
He  wore  a  vest  but  no  coat  Upon  it  was  a  metal  shield. 
In  his  other  hand  he  clutched  a  knotted,  polished  stick. 

**You*re  Anse,  aren't  you?"  I  said.  "I  was  looking  for  you. 
What's  the  matter?" 

*'I  warn  you  that  anything  you  say  will  be  used  against 
you,  *  he  said,  'Tou're  under  arrest." 

*!  killa  heem,"  Julio  said.  He  struggled.  Two  men  held 
him.  The  little  girl  howled  steadily,  holding  the  bread, 
"You  steala  my  seester,"  Julio  said.  "Let  go,  meesters." 

"Steal  his  sister?"  I  said.  "Why,  I've  been— " 

<cSliet  up,"  Anse  said.  "You  can  tell  that  to  Squire.** 

"'Steal  his  sister?"  I  said.  Julio  broke  from  the  men  and 
sprang  at  me  again,  but  the  marshall  met  him  and  they 
struggled  until  the  other  two  pinioned  his  arms  again. 
Anse  released  him,  panting. 

Tou  dum  furriner,"  he  said,  Tve  got  a  good  mind  to 
take  you  up  too,  for  assault  and  battery."  He  turned  to  me 
again.  'Will  you  come  peaceable,  or  do  I  handcuff  youT* 

Til  come  peaceable,"  I  said.  "Anything,  just  so  I  caa 


THE     SOUNB     A3SFD     THE     FXJBY 

find  someone — do  something  with — Stole  Ms  sister/'  I 
said.  "Stole  his— " 

*Tve  warned  you,"  Anse  said,  "He  aims  to  charge  you 
with  meditated  criminal  assault  Here,  you,  make  that 
gal  shut  up  that  noise." 

"Oh/'  I  said.  Then  I  began  to  laugh.  Two  more  boys 
with  plastered  heads  and  round  eyes  came  out  of  the 
bushes,  buttoning  shirts  that  had  already  dampened  onto 
their  shoulders  and  arms,  and  I  tried  to  stop  the  laughter, 
but  I  couldnt. 

"Watch  him,  Anse,  he's  crazy,  I  believe/' 

Til  h-have  to  qu-quit/*  I  said,  "It'll  stop  in  a  mu-min- 
ute.  The  other  time  it  said  ah  ah  ah/*  I  said,  laughing* 
"Let  me  sit  down  a  while/'  I  sat  down,  they  watching  me, 
and  the  little  girl  with  her  streaked  face  and  the  gnawed 
looking  loaf,  and  the  water  swift  and  peaceful  below  the 
path.  After  a  while  the  laughter  ran  out.  But  my  throat 
wouldnt  quit  trying  to  laugh,  like  retching  after  your 
stomach  is  empty. 

"Whoa,  now/'  Anse  said.  "Get  a  grip  on  yourself/' 

"Yes,"  I  said,  tightening  my  throat.  There  was  another 
yellow  butterfly,  like  one  of  the  sunflecks  had  come  loose- 
After  a  while  I  didnt  have  to  hold  my  throat  so  tight  1 
got  up.  "I'm  ready.  Which  way?" 

We  followed  the  path,  the  two  others  watching  Julio 
and  the  little  girl  and  the  boys  somewhere  in  the  rear. 
The  path  went  along  the  river  to  the  bridge.  We  crossed 
it  and  tibe  tracks,  people  coming  to  the  doory  <o  look  at 
us  and  more  boys  materializing  from  somewhere  until 
when  we  turned  into  the  main  street  we  had  quite  a  pro- 
cession. Before  the  drugstore  stood  an  auto,  a  big  one. 
but  I  didn't  recognise  them  until  Mrs  Bland  said, 

"Why,  Quentin!  Quentin  Compson!"  Then  I  saw  Ger- 


l6o        THE     SOTTXD     AND     THE     FtJEY 

aid,  and  Spoade  in  the  back  seat,  sitting  on  the  back  oi 
his  neck.  And  Shreve.  I  didnt  know  the  two  girls. 

"Quentin  Compson!'*  Mrs  Bland  said. 

"Good  afternoon,"  I  said,  raising  my  hat,  "I'm  under 
arrest  I'm  sorry  I  didnt  get  your  note.  Did  Shreve  tell 
you?" 

"Under  arrest?"  Shreve  said.  "Excuse  me/'  he  said.  He 
heaved  himself  up  and  climbed  over  their  feet  and  got 
out.  He  had  on  a  pair  of  my  flannel  pants,  like  a  glove.  I 
didnt  remember  forgetting  them.  I  didnt  remember  how 
many  chins  Mrs  Bland  had,  either.  The  prettiest  girl  was 
with  Gerald  in  front,  too.  They  watched  me  through 
veils,  with  a  kind  of  delicate  horror.  ""Who's  under  arrest?" 
Shreve  said.  "Whafs  this,  mister?" 

"Gerald,"  Mrs  Bland  said,  "Send  these  people  away. 
You  get  in  this  car,  Quentin." 

Gerald  got  out  Spoade  hadnt  moved. 

'What's  he  done,  Cap?"  he  said.  "Robbed  a  hen  house?" 

"I  warn  you,"  Anse  said.  <:Do  you  know  the  prisoner?" 

**Know  him,"  Shreve  said.  "Look  here — yj 

"Then  you  can  come  along  to  the  squire's.  You're  ob- 
structing justice.  Come  along."  He  shook  my  arm. 

<cWell,  good  afternoon,"  I  said.  "I'm  glad  to  have  seen 
you  all.  Sorry  I  couldnt  be  with  you." 

"You,  Gerald,"  Mrs  Bland  said. 

"Look  here,  constable,"  Gerald  said. 

"I  warn  you  you're  interfering  with  an  officer  of  the 
law,"  Anse  said.  "If  you've  anything  to  say,  you  can  come 
to  the  squire's  and  make  cognizance  of  the  prisoner."  Wei 
went  on.  Quite  a  procession  now,  Anse  and  I  leading.  I 
could  hear  them  telling  them  what  it  was,  and  Spoade 
asking  questions,  and  then  Julio  said  something  violently 
in  Italian  and  I  looked  back  and  saw  the  little  girl  stand- 


THE     SOXJNB     AND     THE     FURY        l6l 

ing  at  the  curb  looking  at  me  with  her  friendly,  inscrut- 
able regard. 

"Git  on  home/'  Julio  shouted  at  her,  "I  beat  hell  outa 
you." 

We  went  down  the  street  and  turned  into  a  bit  of  lawn 
in  which,  set  back  from  the  street,  stood  a  one  storey 
building  of  brick  trimmed  with  white.  We  went  up  the 
rock  path  to  the  door,  where  Anse  halted  everyone 
except  us  and  made  them  remain  outside.  We  entered  a 
bare  room  smelling  of  stale  tobacco.  There  was  a  sheel 
iron  stove  in  the  center  of  a  wooden  frame  filled  with 
sand,  and  a  faded  map  on  the  wall  and  the  dingy  plat  of 
a  township.  Behind  a  scarred  littered  table  a  man  with  a 
fierce  roach  of  iron  grey  hair  peered  at  us  over  steel  spec- 
tacles. 

"Got  him,  did  ye,  Anse?"  he  said. 

"Got  him,  Squire." 

He  opened  a  huge  dusty  book  and  drew  it  to  him  and 
dipped  a  foul  pen  into  an  inkwell  filled  with  what  looked 
like  coal  dust. 

"Look  here,  mister/'  Shreve  said. 

"The  prisoner's  name/'  the  squire  said.  I  told  him.  He 
wrote  it  slowly  into  the  book,  the  pen  scratching  with  ex- 
cruciating deliberation. 

"Look  here,  mister,"  Shreve  said,  'We  know  this  fellow: 
We—" 

"Order  in  the  court,"  Anse  said. 

"Shut  up,  bud,"  Spoade  said.  "Let  him  do  it  his  way, 
He's  going  to  anyhow." 

"Age,"  the  squire  said.  I  told  him.  He  wrote  that,  hi& 
mouth  moving  as  he  wrote.  "Occupation."  I  told  him, 
"Harvard  student,  hey?"  he  said.  He  looked  up  at  me, 
bowing  his  neck  a  little  to  see  over  the  spectacles.  His 


THE     SOXJXD     AND     THE     FURY 

eyes  were  clear  and  cold,  like  a  goat's.  ""What  are  you 
up  to,  coming  out  here  kidnapping  children?" 

"They're  crazy,  Squire/'  Shreve  said.  'Whoever  says 
this  boy's  kidnapping — " 

Julio  moved  violently.  "Crazy?"  he  said.  "Dont  I  catcha 
heem,  eh?  Dont  I  see  weetha  my  own  eyes — " 

"You're  a  liar,3*  Shreve  said.  "You  never — " 

"Order,  order/*  Anse  said,  raising  his  voice. 

"You  fellers  shet  up/*  the  squire  said.  "If  they  dont  stay 
quiet,  turn  *em  out,  Anse."  They  got  quiet  The  squire 
looked  at  Shreve,  then  at  Spoade,  then  at  Gerald.  "You 
know  this  young  man?'*  h©  said  to  Spoade. 

"Yes,  your  honour/*  Spoade  said.  "He's  just  a  country 
boy  in  school  up  there.  He  dont  mean  any  harm.  I  think 
the  marshallTl  find  it's  a  mistake.  His  father's  a  congrega- 
tional minister/' 

"H'm,"  the  squire  said.  **What  was  you  doing,  exactly?" 
I  told  him,  he  watching  me  with  his  cold,  pale  eyes.  "How 
about  it,  Anse?" 

"Might  have  been,"  Anse  said.  "Them  durn  furriners.'' 

"I  American,"  Julio  said.  *T  gotta  da  papeY* 

"Where's  the  gal?" 

"He  sent  her  home,"  Anse  said. 

"Was  she  scared  or  anything?" 

"Not  till  Julio  there  jumped  on  the  prisoner.  They  were 
just  walking  along  the  river  path,  towards  town.  Some 
boys  swimming  told  us  which  way  they  went." 

"It's  a  mistake,  Squire/'  Spoade  said.  "Children  and 
dogs  are  always  taking  up  with  him  like  that.  He  cant 
help  it." 

^H'm,"  the  squire  said.  He  looked  out  of  the  window 
for  a  while.  We  watched  him.  I  could  hear  Julio  scratch- 
ing himself.  The  squire  looked  back. 


THE     SOUND      AND     THE      FURY         163 

"Air  you  satisfied  the  gal  aint  took  any  hurt,  you, 
there?" 

"No  hurt  now,"  Julio  said  sullenly. 

"You  quit  work  to  hunt  for  her?'9 

"Sure  I  quit.  I  run.  I  run  like  hell  Looka  hare,  looka 
there,  then  man  tella  me  he  seen  him  giva  her  she  eat. 
She  go  weetha." 

TEfm,"  the  squire  said.  "Well,  son,  I  calculate  you  owe 
Julio  something  for  taking  him  away  from  his  work/* 

"Yes,  sir,"  I  said.  "How  much?" 

"Dollar,  I  calculate." 

I  gave  Julio  a  dollar. 

"Well,"  Spoade  said,  "If  that's  all — I  reckon  he's  dis- 
charged, your  honour?" 

The  squire  didn't  look  at  him.  "How  far'd  you  run  him, 
Anse?" 

"Two  miles,  at  least.  It  was  about  two  hours  before  we 
caught  him." 

"H'm,"  the  squire  said.  He  mused  a  while.  We  watched 
him,  his  stiff  crest,  the  spectacles  riding  low  on  his  nose. 
The  yellow  shape  of  the  window  grew  slowly  across  the 
fioor,  reached  the  wall,  climbing.  Dust  motes  whirled  ancl 
slanted.  "Six  dollars." 

"Six  dollars?"  Shreve  said.  "What's  that  for?" 

"Six  dollars,"  the  squire  said.  He  looked  at  Shreve  a 
moment,  then  at  me  again. 

"Look  here/*  Shreve  said. 

"Shut  up,"  Spoade  said.  "Give  it  to  him,  bud,  and  let's 
get  out  of  here.  The  ladies  are  waiting  for  us.  You  got 
six  dollars?" 

"Yes,"  I  said.  I  gave  him  six  dollars. 

"Case  dismissed,"  he  said, 

'You  get  a  receipt/*  Shreve  said.  "You  get  a  signed  re- 
ceipt for  that  monev." 


THE    SOUND    A::D    x  .E    FUKY 

The  squire  looked  at  Slireve  mildly.  "Case  dismissed, 
he  said  without  raising  lr,..  voice. 

Til  be  damned — "  Shreve  said. 

"Come  on  here/'  Spoade  said,  taking  his  arm.  "Good 
afternoon,  Judge.  Much  obliged/'  As  we  passed  out  the 
door  Julio's  voice  rose  again,  violent,  then  ceased.  Spoade 
was  looking  at  me,  his  brown  eyes  quizzical,  a  littl© 
cold.  "Well,  bud,  I  reckon  you'll  do  your  girl  chasing  in 
Boston  after  this." 

"You  damned  fool,"  Shreve  said,  'What  the  hell  do  you 
mean  anyway,  straggling  off  here,  fooling  with  these 
damn  wops?" 

"Come  on,"  Spoade  said,  "They  must  be  getting  impa- 

,»          .    yy 

tient. 

Mrs  Bland  was  talking  to  them.  They  were  Miss 
Holmes  and  Miss  Daingerfield  and  they  quit  listening  to 
her  and  looked  at  me  again  with  that  delicate  and  curi- 
ous horror,  their  veils  turned  back  upon  their  little  white 
noses  and  their  eyes  fleeing  and  mysterious  beneath  the 
veils. 

"Quentin  Compson/*  Mrs  Bland  said,  "What  would  your 
mother  say?  A  young  man  naturally  gets  into  scrapes, 
but  to  be  arrested  on  foot  by  a  country  policeman.  What 
did  they  think  he'd  done,  Gerald?" 

"Nothing/*  Gerald  said. 

"Nonsense.  What  was  it,  you,  Spoade?" 

"He  was  trying  to  kidnap  that  little  dirty  girl,  but  they 
caught  him  In  time,"  Spoade  said. 

"Nonsense,"  Mrs  Bland  said,  but  her  voice  sort  of  died 
away  and  she  stared  at  me  for  a  moment,  and  the  girls 
drew  their  breaths  in  with  a  soft  concerted  sound.  "Fid- 
dlesticks," Mrs  Bland  said  briskly,  "If  that  isn't  just  like 
tibese  ignorant  lowclass  Yankees,  Get  in,  Quentin/* 


THE     SOU  .    «     AND     THE     FUEY        165 

Slireve  and  I  sa':  on  two  small  collapsible  seats.  Gerald 
cranked  the  car  and  got  in  and  we  started. 

"Now,  Queniin,  you  tell  me  what  all  this  foolishness 
is  abouj,  Mrs  Bland  said.  I  told  them,  Shreve  hunched 
aac  furious  on  his  little  seat  and  Spoade  sitting  again 
on  the  back  of  his  neck  beside  Miss  Daingerfield. 

*'And  the  joke  is,  all  the  time  Quentin  had  us  all  fooled/3 
Spoade  said.  "All  the  time  we  thought  he  was  the  model 
youth  that  anybody  could  trust  a  daughter  with,  until 
the  police  showed  him  up  at  his  nefarious  work/* 

"Hush  up,  Spoade,'"  Mrs  Bland  said.  We  drove  down 
the  street  and  crossed  the  bridge  and  passed  the  house 
where  the  pink  garment  hung  in  the  window.  'That's 
what  you  get  for  not  reading  my  note.  Why  didnt  you 
come  and  get  it?  Mr  MacKenzie  says  he  told  you  it  was 
there." 

**Yessum.  I  intended  to,  but  I  never  went  back  to  the 
room/' 

"You'd  have  let  us  sit  there  waiting  I  dont  know  how 
long,  if  it  hadnt  been  for  Mr  MacKenzie.  When  lie  said 
you  hadnt  come  back,  that  left  an  extra  place*  so  we 
asked  him  to  come.  We're  very  glad  to  have  you  anyway, 
Mr  MacKenzie."  Shreve  said  nothing.  His  amis  were 
folded  and  he  glared  straight  ahead  past  Gerald's  cap.  It 
was  a  cap  for  motoring  in  England.  Mrs  Bland  said  so. 
We  passed  that  house,  and  three  others,  and  another  yard 
where  the  little  girl  stood  by  the  gate.  She  didnt  have  the 
bread  now,  and  her  face  looked  like  it  had  been  streaked 
with  coaldust.  I  waved  my  hand,  but  she  made  no  reply., 
only  her  head  turned  slowly  as  the  car  passed,  following 
us  with  her  unwinking  gaze.  Then  we  ran  beside  the 
wall,  our  shadows  running  along  the  wall,  and  after  a 
while  we  passed  a  piece  of  torn  newspaper  lying  besid© 


t66        THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FUBY 

the  road  and  I  began  to  laugh  again.  I  could  feel  it  in  my 
throat  and  I  looked  off  into  the  trees  where  the  afternoon 
slanted,  thinking  of  afternoon  and  of  the  bird  and  the 
boys  in  swimming.  But  still  I  couldnt  stop  it  and  then  I 
knew  that  if  I  tried  too  hard  to  stop  it  I'd  be  crying  and 
I  thought  about  how  I'd  thought  about  I  could  not  be  a 
virgin,  with  so  many  o£  them  walking  along  in  the  shad- 
ows and  whispering  with  their  soft  girlvoices  lingering  im 
the  shadowy  places  and  the  words  coming  out  and  per- 
fume and  eyes  you  could  /eel  not  see,  but  if  it  was  that 
simple  to  do  it  wouldnt  be  anything  and  if  it  wasnt  any- 
thing, what  was  I  and  then  Mrs  Bland  said,  "Quentin?  Is 
he  sick,  Mr  MacKenzie?"  and  then  Shreve's  fat  hand 
touched  my  knee  and  Spoade  began  talking  and  I  quit 
trying  to  stop  it. 

"If  that  hamper  is  in  his  way,  Mr  MacKenzie,  move  it 
over  on  your  side.  I  brought  a  hamper  of  wine  because 
I  think  young  gentlemen  should  drink  wine,  although  my 
father,  Gerald's  grandfather5*  ever  do  that  Have  you  ever 
done  that  In  the  grey  darkness  a  little  light  her  hands 
locked  about 

'They  do,  when  they  can  get  it,"  Spoade  said.  "Hey, 
Shreve?"  her  knees  her  face  looking  at  the  sky  the  smell 
of  honeysuckle  upon  her  face  and  throat 

TBeer,  too,"  Shreve  said.  His  hand  touched  my  knee 
again.  I  moved  rny  knee  again,  like  a  thin  wash  of  WMC 
coloured  paint  talking  about  him  bringing 

"You're  not  a  gentleman,"  Spoade  said,  him  between  u$ 
until  the  shape  of  her  blurred  not  with  dark 

"No.  I'm  Canadian/*  Shreve  said,  talking  about  him  the 
oar  blades  winking  him  along  winking  the  Cap  made  for 
motoring  m  England  and  all  time  rushing  beneath  and 
they  two  blurred  within  the  other  forever  more  he  had 
been  m  the  army  had  killed  men 


THE     SOUND     A3SFD     THE     FZJBY 

"I  adore  Canada,"  Miss  Daingerfield  said.  "I  think  it's 
marvellous." 

"Did  you  ever  drink  perfume?"  Spoade  said,  with  one 
hand  he  could  lift  her  to  his  shoulder  and  run  with  her 
running  Running 

"No/*  Shreve  said,  running  the  beast  with  two  backs 
and  she  blurred  in  the  winking  oars  running  the  swine  of 
Euboeleus  running  coupled  within  how  many  Caddy 

"Neither  did  I,"  Spoade  said.  I  dont  know  too  many 
there  was  something  terrible  in  me  terrible  in  me  Father 
1  have  committed  Have  you  ever  done  that  We  didnt  we 
didnt  do  that  did  we  do  that 

"and  Gerald's  grandfather  always  picked  his  own  mint 
before  breakfast,  while  the  dew  was  still  on  it.  He 
wouldnt  even  let  old  Wilkie  touch  it  do  you  remember 
Gerald  but  always  gathered  it  himself  and  made  his  own 
julep.  He  was  as  crochety  about  his  julep  as  an  old  maid, 
measuring  everything  by  a  recipe  in  his  h@ad.  There  was 
only  one  man  he  ever  gave  that  recipe  to;  that  was"  we 
did  how  can  y&u  not  know  it  if  youll  fuM  w&it  TU  tell  you 
how  it  was  it  was  a  crime  we  did  &  terrible  crime  it  can- 
not be  hid  you  think  it  can  but  wmb  Poor  Quentin 
youve  never  done  that  have  you  and  TU  tell  yon  how  it 
was  Til  tell  Father  then  itll  have  to  be  becmtse  you  love 
Father  then  weU  have  to  go  away  amid  the  pointing  and 
the  horror  the  clean  -flame  Til  make  you  my  we  did  Tm 
stronger  than  you  Til  make  you  know  we  did  y&u  thought 
it  was  them  but  it  was  me  listen  I  f®oled  y®u  &ll  the  time 
it  was  me  you  thought  I  was  in  the  h@use  where  that 
damn  honeysuckle  trying  not  to  think  the  swing  the  ce- 
dars the  secret  surges  the  breathing  locked  drinking  the 
wild  breath  the  yes  Yes  Jes  yes  "never  be  got  to  drink 
wine  himself,  but  he  always  said  that  a  hamper  what 
book  did  you  read  that  in  the  one  where  Geralds  rowing 


168        THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FURY 

rait  of  wine  was  a  necessary  part  of  any  gentlemen's  pic- 
Mc  basket"  did  you  love  them  Caddtj  did  you  love  them 
When  they  touched  me  I  died 

one  minute  she  was  standing  there  the  next  he  was  yell- 
ing and  pulling  at  her  dress  they  went  into  the  hall  and 
up  the  stairs  yelling  and  shoving  at  her  up  the  stairs  to 
the  bathroom  door  and  stopped  her  back  against  the  dooi 
and  her  arm  across  her  face  yelling  and  trying  to  shove 
her  Into  the  bathroom  when  she  came  in  to  supper  T.  P 
was  feeding  him  he  started  again  just  whimpering  at 
first  until  she  touched  Mm  then  he  yelled  she  stood  thero 
her  eyes  like  cornered  rats  then  I  was  running  in  the  gre). 
darkness  it  smelled  of  rain  and  all  flower  scents  the  damp 
Warm  air  released  and  crickets  sawing  away  in  the  grass 
pacing  me  with  a  small  travelling  island  of  silence  Fancy 
watched  me  across  the  fence  blotchy  like  a  quilt  on  a 
line  I  thought  damn  that  nigger  he  forgot  to  feed  her 
-again  I  ran  down  the  hill  in  that  vacuum  of  crickets  like 
a  breath  travelling  across  a  mirror  she  was  lying  in  the 
water  her  head  on  the  sand  spit  the  water  flowing  about 
her  hips  there  was  a  little  more  light  in  the  water  hei 
skirt  half  saturated  flopped  along  ber  flanks  to  the  waters 
tootion  in  heavy  ripples  going  nowhere  renewed  them- 
selves of  their  own  movement  I  stood  on  the  bank  I  could 
smell  the  honeysuckle  on  the  water  gap  the  air  seemed  to 
drizzle  with  honeysuckle  and  with  the  rasping  of  crick- 
ets a  substance  you  could  feel  on  the  flesh 

is  Benjy  still  crying 

I  dont  know  yes  I  dont  know 

poor  Benjy 

I  sat  down  on  the  bank  the  grass  was  damp  a  littlt 
then  I  found  my  shoes  wet 

get  out  of  that  water  are  you  crazy 


THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FUEY 

dut  she  didnt  move  her  face  was  a  white  blur  framed 
out  of  the  blur  of  the  sand  by  her  hair 

get  out  now 

she  sat  up  then  she  rose  her  skirt  flopped  against  her 
draining  she  climbed  the  bank  her  clothes  flopping  sat 
down 

why  dont  you  wring  it  out  do  you  want  to  catch  cold 

yes 

the  water  sucked  and  gurgled  across  the  sand  spit  and 
on  in  the  dark  among  the  willows  across  the  shallow  the 
water  rippled  like  a  piece  of  cloth  holding  still  a  little 
light  as  water  does 

he's  crossed  all  the  oceans  all  around  the  world 

then  she  talked  about  him  clasping  her  wet  knees  her 
face  tilted  back  in  the  grey  light  the  smell  of  honeysuckle 
there  was  a  light  in  mothers  room  and  in  Benjys  where 
T.  P.  was  putting  him  to  bed 

do  you  love  him 

her  hand  came  out  I  didnt  move  it  fumbled  down  my 
arm  and  she  held  my  hand  flat  against  her  chest  her  heart 
thudding 

no  no 

did  he  make  you  then  he  made  you  do  it  let  him  he 
was  stronger  than  you  and  he  tomorrow  111  kill  him  I 
swear  I  will  father  neednt  know  until  afterward  and 
then  you  and  I  nobody  need  ever  know  we  can  take  my 
school  money  we  can  cancel  my  matriculation  Caddy  you 
hate  him  dont  you  dont  you 

she  held  my  hand  against  her  chest  her  heart  thudding 
I  turned  and  caught  her  arm 

Caddy  you  hate  him  dont  you 

she  moved  my  hand  up  against  her  throat  her  heart 
was  hammering  there 


THE     SOUND     A3SFD     THE     FURY 

poor  Quentin 

her  face  looked  at  the  sky  it  was  low  so  low  that  all 
smells  and  sounds  of  night  seemed  to  have  been  crowded 
down  like  under  a  slack  tent  especially  the  honeysuckle  it 
had  got  into  my  breathing  it  was  on  her  face  and  throat 
Eke  paint  her  blood  pounded  against  my  hand  I  was  lean- 
ing on  my  other  arm  it  began  to  jerk  and  jump  and  I  had 
to  pant  to  get  any  air  at  all  out  o£  that  thick  grey  honey- 
suckle 

yes  I  hate  him  I  would  die  for  him  I've  already  died 
for  him  I  die  for  him  over  and  over  again  everytime  this 
goes 

when  I  lifted  my  hand  I  could  still  feel  crisscrossed 
twigs  and  grass  burning  into  the  palm 

poor  Queniin 

she  leaned  back  on  her  arms  her  hands  locked  about 
her  knees 

youve  never  done  that  have  you 

what  done  what 

that  what  I  have  what  I  did 

yes  yes  lots  of  tiroes  with  lots  of  girls 

then  7.  was  crying  her  hand  touched  me  again  and  I 
was  crying  against  her  damp  blouse  then  she  lying  on  her 
back  looking  past  my  head  into  the  sky  I  could  see  a  rim 
of  white  under  her  irises  I  opened  my  knife 

do  you  remember  the  day  damuddy  died  when  you  sat 
down  in  the  water  in  your  drawers 

yes 

I  held  the  point  of  the  knife  at  her  throat 

it  wont  take  but  a  second  just  a  second  then  I  can  do 
*mne  I  can  do  mine  then 

all  right  can  you  do  yours  by  yourself 

yes  the  blades  long  enough  Benjys  in  bed  by  now 

yes 


THE     fcOXJNB     AHB     THE 

it  wont  take  but  a  second  111  try  not  to  hurt 

all  right 

will  you  close  your  eyes 

no  like  this  youll  have  to  push  it  harder 

touch  your  hand  to  it 

but  she  didnt  move  her  eyes  were  wide  open  looking 
past  my  head  at  the  sky 

Caddy  do  you  remember  how  Dilsey  fussed  at  you  be- 
cause your  drawers  were  muddy 

dont  cry 

Im  not  crying  Caddy 

push  it  are  you  going  to 

do  you  want  me  to 

yes  push  it 

touch  your  hand  to  it 

dont  cry  poor  Quentin 

but  I  couldnt  stop  she  held  my  head  against  her  damp 
hard  breast  I  could  hear  her  heart  going  firm  and  slow 
now  not  hammering  and  the  water  gurgling  among  the 
willows  in  the  dark  and  waves  of  honeysuckle  coming  up 
the  air  my  arm  and  shoulder  were  twisted  under  me 

what  is  it  what  are  you  doing 

her  muscles  gathered  I  sat  up 

its  my  knife  I  dropped  it 

she  sat  up 

what  time  is  it 

I  dont  know 

she  rose  to  her  feet  I  fumbled  along  the  ground 

Im  going  let  it  go 

I  could  feel  her  standing  there  I  could  smell  her  damp 
clothes  feeling  her  there 

its  right  here  somewhere 

let  it  go  you  can  find  it  tomorrow  come  on 

wait  a  minute  I'll  find  it 


THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FXJBY 

are  you  afraid  to 

here  it  is  It  was  right  here  all  the  time 

was  it  come  on 

I  got  up  and  followed  we  went  up  the  hill  the  crickets 
hushing  before  us 

its  funny  how  you.  can  sit  down  and  drop  something 
and  have  to  hunt  all  around  for  it 

the  grey  it  was  grey  with  dew  slanting  up  into  the  grey 
sky  then  the  trees  beyond 

damn  that  honeysuckle  I  wish  it  would  stop 

you  used  to  like  it 

we  crossed  the  crest  and  went  on  toward  the  trees  she 
walked  into  me  she  gave  over  a  little  the  ditch  was  a 
black  scar  on  the  grey  grass  she  walked  into  me  again 
Ae  looked  at  me  and  gave  over  we  reached  the  ditch 

lets  go  this  way 

what  for 

lets  see  if  you  can  still  see  Nancys  bones  I  havent 
thought  to  look  in  a  long  time  have  you 

it  was  matted  with  vines  and  briers  dark 

they  were  right  here  you  cant  tell  whether  you  see 
them  or  not  can  you 

stop  Quentin 

come  on 

the  ditch  narrowed  closed  she  turned  toward  the  trees 

stop  Quentin 

Caddy 

I  got  in  front  of  her  again 

Caddy 

stop  it 

I  held  her 

Im  stronger  than  you. 

she  was  motionless  hard  unyielding  but  stil] 
I  wont  fight  stop  youd  better  stop 


THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FUBY        173 

Caddy  dont  Caddy 

it  wont  do  any  good  dont  you  know  It  wont  let  me  go 

the  honeysuckle  drizzled  and  drizzled  I  could  hear  the 
crickets  watching  us  in  a  circle  she  moved  back  went 
around  me  on  toward  the  trees 

you  go  on  back  to  the  house  you  neednt  come 

I  went  on 

why  dont  you  go  on  back  to  the  house 

damn  that  honeysuckle 

we  reached  the  fence  she  crawled  through  I  crawled 
through  when  I  rose  from  stooping  he  was  coming  out  of 
the  trees  into  the  grey  toward  us  coming  toward  us  tall 
and  flat  and  still  even  moving  like  he  was  still  she  went 
to  him 

this  is  Quentin  Im  wet  Im  wet  all  over  you  dont 
have  to  if  you  dont  want  to 

their  shadows  one  shadow  her  head  rose  it  was  above 
his  on  the  sky  higher  their  two  heads 

you  dont  have  to  if  you  dont  want  to 

then  not  two  heads  the  darkness  smelled  of  rain  of 
damp  grass  and  leaves  the  grey  light  drizzling  like  rain 
the  honeysuckle  coming  up  in  damp  waves  I  could  see 
her  face  a  blur  against  his  shoulder  he  held  her  in  one 
arm  like  she  was  no  bigger  than  a  child  he  extended  his 
hand 

glad  to  know  you 

we  shook  hands  then  we  stood  there  her  shadow  high 
against  his  shadow  one  shadow 

whatre  you  going  to  do  Quentin 

walk  a  while  I  think  111  go  through  the  woods  to  the 
road  and  come  back  through  town 

I  turned  away  going 

goodnight 

Quentin 


*74        THE     SOUND     AHB     THE     FURY 

I  stopped 

what  do  you  want 

in  the  woods  the  tree  frogs  were  going  smelling  rain  in 
the  air  they  sounded  like  toy  music  boxes  that  were  hard 
to  turn  and  the  honeysuckle 

come  here 

what  do  you  want 

come  here  Quentin 

1  went  back  she  touched  my  shoulder  leaning  down 
her  shadow  the  blur  of  her  face  leaning  down  from  his 
high  shadow  I  drew  back 

look  out 

you  go  on  home 

Im  not  sleepy  Im  going  to  take  a  walk 

wait  for  me  at  the  branch 

Im  going  for  a  walk 

111  be  there  soon  wait  for  me  you  wait 

no  Im  going  through  the  woods 

I  didnt  look  back  the  tree  frogs  didnt  pay  me  any  mind 
the  grey  light  like  moss  in  the  trees  drizzling  but  still  it 
wouldnt  rain  after  a  while  I  turned  went  back  to  the  edge 
of  the  woods  as  soon  as  I  got  there  I  began  to  smell  hon- 
eysuckle again  I  could  see  the  lights  on  the  courthouse 
clock  and  the  glare  of  town  the  square  on  the  sky  and 
the  dark  willows  along  the  branch  and  the  light  in 
mothers  windows  the  light  still  on  in  Benjys  room  and  I 
stooped  through  the  fence  and  went  across  the  pasture 
running  I  ran  in  the  grey  grass  among  the  crickets  the 
honeysuckle  getting  stronger  and  stronger  and  the  smell 
of  water  then  I  could  see  the  water  the  colour  of  grey 
honeysuckle  I  lay  down  on  the  bank  with  my  face  close 
to  the  ground  so  I  couldnt  smell  the  honeysuckle  I 
couldnt  smell  it  then  and  I  lay  there  feeling  the  earth  go- 
ing through  my  clothes  listening  to  the  water  and  after  a 


THE     SOUND     AND     OCHE     FITEY 

while  I  wasnt  breathing  so  hard  and  I  lay  there  thinking 
that  if  I  didnt  move  my  face  I  wouldnt  have  to  breathe 
hard  and  smell  it  and  then  I  wasnt  thinking  about  any- 
thing at  all  she  came  along  the  bank  and  stopped  I  diditf 
move 

its  late  you  go  on  home 

what 

you  go  on  home  its  late 

all  right 

her  clothes  rustled  I  didnt  move  they  stopped  rastiMg 

are  you  going  in  like  I  told  you 

I  didnt  hear  anything 

Caddy 

yes  I  will  if  you  want  me  to  I  will 

I  sat  up  she  was  sitting  on  the  ground  her  hands 
clasped  about  her  knee 

go  on  to  the  house  like  I  told  you 

yes  111  do  anything  you  want  me  to  anything  yes 

she  didnt  even  look  at  me  I  caught  her  shoulder  and 
shook  her  hard 

you  shut  up 

I  shook  her 

you  shut  up  you  shut  up 

yes 

she  lifted  her  face  then  I  saw  she  wasnt  even  looking 
at  me  at  all  I  could  see  that  white  rim 

get  up 

I  pulled  her  she  was  limp  I  lifted  her  to  her  feet 

go  on  now 

was  Benjy  still  crying  when  you  left 

go  on 

we  crossed  the  branch  the  roof  came  in  sight  then  the 
window  upstairs 

hes  asleep  now 


THE     SOUND     AND     THE     TUEY 

I  had  to  stop  and  fasten  the  gate  she  went  on  in  the 
grey  light  the  smell  of  rain  and  still  it  wouldnt  rain  and 
honeysuckle  beginning  to  come  from  the  garden  fence  be- 
ginning she  went  into  the  shadow  I  could  hear  her  feet- 

Caddy 

I  stopped  at  the  steps  I  couldnt  hear  her  feet 
Caddy 

I  heard  her  feet  then  my  hand  touched  her  not  warm 
not  cool  just  still  her  clothes  a  little  damp  still 
do  you  love  him  now 

not  breathing  except  slow  like  far  away  breathing 
Caddy  do  you  love  him  now 
I  dont  know 

outside  the  grey  light  the  shadows  of  things  like  dead 
things  in  stagnant  water 
I  wish  you  were  dead 
do  you  you  coining  in  now 
are  you  thinking  about  him  now 
I  dont  know 

tell  me  what  youre  thinking  about  tell  me 
stop  stop  Quentin 

you  shut  up  you  shut  up  you  hear  me  you  shut  up  are 
you  going  to  shut  up 

all  right  I  will  stop  well  make  too  much  noise 

III  kill  you  do  you  hear 

lets  go  out  to  the  swing  theyll  hear  you  here 

Im  not  crying  do  you  say  Im  crying 

no  hush  now  well  wake  Benjy  up 

you  go  on  into  the  house  go  on  now 

I  am  dont  cry  Im  bad  anyway  you  cant  help  it 

theres  a  curse  on  us  its  not  our  fault  is  it  our  fault 

tush  come  on  and  go  to  bed  now 

you  cant  make  me  theres  a  curse  on  us 


THE     SOUND     AIN"D     THE     FURY         *7/ 

finally  I  saw  him  he  was  just  going  into  the  barbershop 
he  looked  out  I  went  on  and  waited 

Ive  been  looking  for  you  two  or  three  days 

you  wanted  to  see  me 

Im  going  to  see  you 

he  rolled  the  cigarette  quickly  with  about  two  motions 
he  struck  the  match  with  his  thumb 

we  cant  talk  here  suppose  I  meet  you  somewhere 

111  come  to  your  room  are  you  at  the  hotel 

no  thats  not  so  good  you  know  that  bridge  over  the 
creek  in  there  back  of 

yes  all  right 

at  one  oclock  right 

yes 

I  turned  away 

Im  obliged  to  you 

look 

I  stopped  looked  back 

she  all  right 

he  looked  like  he  was  made  out  of  bronze  his 
shirt 

she  need  me  for  anything  now 

I'll  be  there  at  one 

she  heard  me  tell  T.  P.  to  saddle  Prince  at  one  oclocfc 
she  kept  watching  me  not  eating  much  she  came  too 

what  are  you  going  to  do 

nothing  cant  I  go  for  a  ride  if  I  want  to 

/oure  going  to  do  something  what  is  it 

none  of  your  business  whore  whore 

T.  P.  had  Prince  at  the  side  door 

I  wont  want  him  Im  going  to  walk 

I  went  down  the  drive  and  out  the  gate  I  turned  into 
the  lane  then  I  ran  before  I  reached  the  bridge  I  saw  him 
leaning  on  the  rail  the  horse  was  hitched  in  the  woods  he 


THE     SOUKD     AND     THE     FUBY 

lacked  over  his  shoulder  then  he  turned  his  back  he  didnt 
look  np  until  I  came  onto  the  bridge  and  stopped  he  had 
a  piece  of  bark  in  his  hands  breaking  pieces  from  it  and 
dropping  them  over  the  rail  into  the  water 

I  came  to  tell  you  to  leave  town 

he  broke  a  piece  of  bark  deliberately  dropped  it  care- 
fully into  the  water  watched  it  float  away 

I  said  you  must  leave  town 

he  looked  at  me 

did  she  send  you  to  me 

I  say  you  must  go  not  my  father  not  anybody  I  say  it 

listen  save  this  for  a  while  I  want  to  know  if  shes  all 
right  have  they  been  bothering  her  up  there 

thats  something  you  dont  need  to  trouble  yourself 
about 

then  I  heard  myself  saying  111  give  you  until  sundown 
to  leave  town 

he  broke  a  piece  of  bark  and  dropped  it  into  the  water 
then  he  laid  the  bark  on  the  rail  and  rolled  a  cigarette 
with  those  two  swift  motions  spun  the  match  over  the 
rail 

what  will  you  do  if  I  dont  leave 

111  kill  you  dont  think  that  just  because  I  look  like  a 
kid  to  you 

the  smoke  flowed  in  two  jets  from  his  nostrils  across  his 
face 

how  old  are  you 

I  began  to  shake  my  hands  were  on  the  rail  I  thought  if 
I  hid  them  hed  know  why 

111  give  you  until  tonight 

listen  buddy  whats  your  name  Benjys  the  natural  isnt 
lie  you  are 

Quentin 

my  mouth  said  it  I  didnt  say  it  at  all 


THE     SOUND     AHD     THE     FURY         1 7? 

Ill  give  you  till  sundown 

Quentin 

lie  raked  the  cigarette  ash  carefully  off  against  the  rail 
he  did  it  slowly  and  carefully  like  sharpening  a  pencil  my 
hands  had  quit  shaking 

listen  no  good  taking  it  so  hard  its  not  your  fault  lad 
it  would  have  been  some  other  fellow 

did  you  ever  have  a  sister  did  you 

no  but  theyre  all  bitches 

I  hit  him  my  open  hand  beat  the  impulse  to  shut  it  to 
his  face  his  hand  moved  as  fast  as  mine  the  cigarette  went 
over  the  rail  I  swung  with  the  other  hand  he  caught  it  too, 
before  the  cigarette  reached  the  water  he  held  both  my 
wrists  in  the  same  hand  his  other  hand  flicked  to  his  arm- 
pit under  his  coat  behind  him  the  sun  slanted  and  a  bird 
singing  somewhere  beyond  the  sun  we  looked  at  one  an- 
other while  the  bird  singing  he  turned  my  hands  loose 

look  here 

he  took  the  bark  from  the  rail  and  dropped  it  into  the 
water  it  bobbed  up  the  current  took  it  floated  away  his 
hand  lay  on  the  rail  holding  the  pistol  loosely  we  waited 

you  cant  hit  it  now 

no 

it  floated  on  it  was  quite  still  in  the  woods  I  heard  the 
bird  again  and  the  water  afterward  the  pistol  came  up  he 
didnt  aim  at  all  the  bark  disappeared  then  pieces  of  it 
floated  up  spreading  he  hit  two  more  of  them  pieces  of 
bark  no  bigger  than  silver  dollars 

thats  enough  I  guess 

he  swung  the  cylinder  out  and  blew  into  £he  barrel  a 
thin  wisp  of  smoke  dissolved  he  reloaded  the  three 
chambers  shut  the  cylinder  he  handed  it  to  me  butt  first 

what  for  I  wont  try  to  beat  that 


i8o        THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FURY 

youll  need  it  from  what  you  said  Im  giving  you  this 
one  because  youve  seen  what  itll  do 

to  hell  with  your  gun 

I  hit  him  I  was  still  trying  to  hit  him  long  after  he  was 
holding  my  wrists  but  I  still  tried  then  it  was  like  I  was 
looking  at  him  through  a  piece  of  coloured  glass  I  could 
bear  my  blood  and  then  1  could  see  the  sky  again  and 
branches  against  it  and  the  sun  slanting  through  them 
and  he  holding  me  on  my  feet 

did  you  hit  me 

I  couldnt  hear 

what 

yes  how  do  you  feel 

al  right  let  go 

he  let  me  go  I  leaned  against  the  rail 

do  you  feel  all  right 

let  me  alone  Im  all  right 

can  you  make  it  home  all  right 

go  on  let  me  alone 

youd  better  not  try  to  walk  take  iny  horse 

no  you  go  on 

you  can  hang  the  reins  on  the  pommel  and  turn  him 
loose  he'll  go  back  to  the  stable 

let  me  alone  you  go  on  and  let  me  alone 

I  leaned  on  the  rail  looking  at  the  water  I  heard  him 
untie  the  horse  and  ride  off  and  after  a  while  I  couldnt 
hear  anything  but  the  water  and  then  the  bird  again  I 
left  the  bridge  and  sat  down  with  my  back  against  a  tree 
and  leaned  my  head  against  the  tree  and  shut  my  eyes  a 
patch  of  sun  came  through  and  fell  across  my  eyes  and  I 
moved  a  little  further  around  the  tree  I  heard  the  bird 
again  and  the  water  and  then  everything  sort  of  rolled 
away  and  I  didnt  feel  anything  at  all  I  felt  almost  good 


THE     SOUND     ANB     THE     PITHY        l8l 

after  all  those  days  and  the  nights  with  honeysucHe  com- 
ing up  out  of  the  darkness  into  my  room  where  I  was 
trying  to  sleep  even  when  after  a  while  I  knew  that  he 
hadnt  hit  me  that  he  had  lied  about  that  for  her  sake  too 
and  that  I  had  just  passed  out  like  a  girl  but  even  that 
didnt  matter  anymore  and  I  sat  there  against  the  tree 
with  little  flecks  of  sunlight  brushing  across  my  face  like 
yellow  leaves  on  a  twig  listening  to  the  water  and  not 
thinking  about  anything  at  all  even  when  I  heard  the 
horse  coining  fast  I  sat  there  with  my  eyes  closed  and 
heard  its  feet  bunch  scattering  the  hissing  sand  and  feet 
running  and  her  hard  running  hands 

fool  fool  are  you  hurt 

I  opened  my  eyes  her  hands  running  on  my  face 

I  didnt  know  which  way  until  I  heard  the  pistol  I  didnt 
know  where  I  didnt  think  he  and  you  running  off  slip- 
ping I  didnt  think  he  would  have 

she  held  my  face  between  her  hands  bumping  my 
head  against  the  tree 

stop  stop  that 

I  caught  her  wrists 

quit  that  quit  it 

I  knew  he  wouldnt  I  knew  he  wouldnt 

she  tried  to  bump  my  head  against  the  tree 

I  told  him  never  to  speak  to  me  again  I  told  him 

she  tried  to  break  her  wrists  free 

let  me  go 

stop  it  I'm  stronger  than  you  stop  it  now 

let  me  go  Ive  got  to  catch  him  and  ask  his  let  me  go 
Quentin  please  let  me  go  let  me  go 

all  at  once  she  quit  her  wrists  went  lax 

yes  I  can  tell  him  I  can  make  him  believe  anytime  I  can 
make  him 


THE     SOUXD      AZSTB     THE      FURY 

Caddy 

she  faadnt  hitched  Prince  he  was  liable  to  strike  out  foi 
home  if  the  notion  took  him 

anytime  he  will  believe  me 

do  you  love  him  Caddy 

do  I  what 

she  looked  at  me  then  everything  emptied  out  of  her 
eyes  and  they  looked  like  the  eyes  in  the  statues  blank 
and  unseeing  and  serene 

put  your  hand  against  my  throat 

she  took  my  hand  and  held  it  fiat  against  her  throat 

now  say  his  namo 

Dalton  Ames 

I  felt  the  first  surge  of  blood  there  it  surged  in  strong 
accelerating  beats 

say  it  again 

her  face  looked  off  into  the  trees  where  the  sun  slanted 
and  where  the  bird 

say  it  again 

Dalton  Ames 

her  blood  surged  steadily  beating  and  beating  against 
my  hand 

It  kept  on  running  for  a  long  time,  but  my  face  felt 
cold  and  sort  of  dead,  and  my  eye,  and  the  cut  place  on 
my  finger  was  smarting  again.  I  could  hear  Shreve  work- 
ing the  puxnp?  then  he  came  back  with  the  basin  and  a 
round  blob  of  twilight  wobbling  in  it,  with  a  yellow  edge 
like  a  fading  balloon.,  then  my  reflection.  I  tried  to  see 
my  face  in  it. 

"Has  it  stopped?"  Shreve  said.  "Give  me  the  rag."  He 
tried  to  take  it  from  my  hand. 

"Look  out,"  I  said,  "I  can  do  it  Yes,  it's  about  stopped 
now."  I  dipped  the  rag  again,  breaking  the  balloon.  The 
rag  stained  the  water*  "I  wish  I  had  a  clean  one/' 


THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FUBY 

"You  need  a  piece  of  beefsteak  for  that  eye/'  Shreve 
said.  "Damn  if  you  wont  have  a  sMner  tomorrow.  The 
son  of  a  bitch/'  he  said. 

"Did  I  hurt  him  any?"  I  wrung  out  the  handkerchief 
and  tried  to  clean  the  blood  off  of  my  vest 

"You  cant  get  that  off/'  Shreve  said.  "You'll  have  to 
send  it  to  the  cleaner's.  Come  on,  hold  it  on  your  eye^ 
why  dont  you." 

*1  can  get  some  of  it  off/*  I  said.  But  I  wasn't  doing 
much  good.  "What  sort  of  shape  is  my  collar  in?" 

"I  dont  know/*  Shreve  said,  "Hold  it  against  your  eye. 
Here." 

"Look  out/'  I  said.  "I  can  do  it.  Did  I  hurt  him  any?*' 

"You  may  have  hit  him.  I  may  have  looked  away  just 
then  or  blinked  or  something.  He  boxed  the  hell  out  of 
you.  He  boxed  you  all  over  the  place.  What  did  you  want 
to  fight  him  with  your  fists  for?  You  goddamn  fool.  How 
do  you  feel?" 

"I  feel  fine/'  I  said.  "I  wonder  if  I  can  get  something 
to  clean  my  vest." 

"Oh,  forget  your  damn  clothes.  Does  your  eye  hurt?9* 

"I  feel  fine/'  I  said.  Everything  was  sort  of  violet  and 
still,  the  sky  green  paling  into  gold  beyond  the  gable  of 
the  house  and  a  plume  of  smoke  rising  from  the  chimney 
without  any  wind.  I  heard  the  pump  again.  A  man  was 
filling  a  pail,  watching  us  across  his  pumping  shoulder.  A 
woman  crossed  the  door,  but  she  didnt  look  out.  I  could, 
hear  a  cow  lowing  somewhere. 

"Come  on/'  Shreve  said,  "Let  your  clothes  alone  and 
put  that  rag  on  your  eye.  I'll  send  your  suit  out  first  thing 
tomorrow." 

"All  right.  I'm  sorry  I  didn't  bleed  on  him  a  little,  at 
least." 

"Son  of  a  bitch/'  Shreve  said,  Spoade  came  out  of 


1*4         THE     SOUND     AKB     THE     FUBY 

house,  talking  to  the  woman  I  reckon,  and  crossed  the 
yard.  He  looked  at  me  with  his  cold,  quizzical  eyes. 

'Well,  bud/'  he  said,  looking  at  me,  "I'll  be  damned  if 
you  dont  go  to  a  lot  of  trouble  to  have  your  fun.  Kid- 
napping, then  fighting.  What  do  you  do  on  your  holi- 
days? burn  houses?" 

Tm  all  right,'7  I  said.  "What  did  Mrs  Bland  say?" 

"She's  giving  Gerald  hell  for  bloodying  you  up.  She'll 
give  you  heH  for  letting  him,  when  she  sees  you.  She  dont 
object  to  the  fighting,  it's  the  blood  that  annoys  her.  I 
think  you  lost  caste  with  her  a  little  by  not  holding  your 
blood  better.  How  do  you  feel?" 

"Sure,"  Shreve  said,  "If  you  cant  be  a  Bland,  the  next 
best  thing  is  to  commit  adultery  with  one  or  get  drunk 
and  fight  him,  as  the  case  may  be." 

"Quite  right,"  Spoade  said.  "But  I  didnt  know  Quentin 
Was  drunk" 

"He  wasnt/'  Shreve  said.  "Do  you  have  to  be  drunk  to 
want  to  hit  that  son  of  a  bitch?" 

"Well,  I  think  I'd  have  to  be  pretty  drank  to  try  it, 
after  seeing  how  Quentin  came  out.  Where'd  he  learn  to 
box?" 

"He's  been  going  to  Mike's  every  day,  over  in  town," 
I  said. 

"He  has?"  Spoade  said.  "Did  you  know  that  when  you 
hit  him?" 

1  dont  know,"  I  said.  *T  guess  so.  Yes." 

*Wet  it  again,"  Shreve  said.  "Want  some  fresh  water?" 

"This  is  all  right,"  I  said,  I  dipped  the  cloth  again  and 
teld  it  to  my  eye.  "Wish  I  had  something  to  clear*  my 
vest"  Spoade  was  still  watching  me. 

"Say,"  he  said,  'What  did  you  hit  him  for?  What  was 
It  he  said?" 
*I  do™*  know  T  dont  know  why  I  did." 


THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FZIXY 

"The  first  I  knew  was  when  you  jumped  up  all  of  a 
Sudden  and  said,  TMd  you  ever  have  a  sister?  did  you?* 
and  when  he  said  No,  you  hit  him.  I  noticed  yon  kept 
on  looking  at  him,  but  you  didnt  seem  to  be  paying 
attention  to  what  anybody  was  saying  until  you  jumped 
up  and  asked  him  if  he  had  any  sisters/* 

"Ah,  he  was  blowing  off  as  usual/'  Shreve  said,  "about 
his  women.  You  know:  like  he  does,  before  girls,  so  they 
dont  know  exactly  what  he's  saying.  All  his  damn  innu- 
endo and  lying  and  a  lot  of  stuff  that  dont  make  sense 
even.  Telling  us  about  some  wench  that  he  made  a  date 
with  to  meet  at  a  dance  hall  in  Atlantic  City  and  stood 
her  up  and  went  to  the  hotel  and  went  to  bed  and  how 
he  lay  there  being  sorry  for  her  waiting  on  the  pier  for 
him,  without  him  there  to  give  her  what  she  wanted, 
Talking  about  the  body's  beauty  and  the  sorry  ends 
thereof  and  how  tough  women  have  it,  without  anything 
else  they  can  do  except  lie  on  their  backs.  Leda  lurking 
in  the  bushes,  whimpering  and  moaning  for  the  swan5 
see.  The  son  of  a  bitch.  I'd  hit  him  myself.  Only  Td 
grabbed  up  her  damn  hamper  of  wine  and  done  it  if  ft 
had  been  me/' 

"Oh,"  Spoade  said,  "the  champion  of  dames.  Bud,  yoi2 
excite  not  only  admiration,  but  horror/'  He  looked  at  me^ 
cold  and  quizzical.  "Good  God/'  he  said. 

"I'm  sorry  I  hit  him/'  I  said.  "Do  I  look  too  bad  to  go 
back  and  get  it  over  with?" 

"Apologies.,  hell/*  Shreve  said,  "Let  them  go  to  hell 
We're  going  to  town." 

"He  ought  to  go  back  so  they'll  know  he  fights  like  a 
gentleman/'  Spoade  said.  "Gets  licked  like  one?  I  mean.53 

"Like  tBis?"  Shreve  said,  "With  his  clothes  all  oveS 
blood?" 

"Why,  all  right/'  Spoade  said,  "You  know  best/* 


THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FURY 

"He  cant  go  around  in  his  undershirt,'*  Shreve  said, 
**He*s  not  a  senior  yet  Come  on,  let* s  go  to  town." 

"You  neednt  come/*  I  said.  "You  go  on  back  to  the  pic- 
nic." 

"Hell  with  them/*  Shreve  said.  "Come  on  here." 

<cWhatll  I  tell  them?"  Spoade  said.  "Tell  them  you  and 
Quentin  had  a  fight  too?" 

'Tell  them  nothing/'  Shreve  said.  'Tell  her  her  option 
expired  at  sunset.  Come  on,  Quentin.  Ill  ask  that  woman 
where  the  nearest  interurban — " 

"No,"  I  said,  "I'm  not  going  back  to  town." 

Shreve  stopped,  looking  at  me.  Turning,  his  glasses 
looked  like  small  yellow  moons. 

'What  are  you  going  to  do?" 

Tm  not  going  back  to  town  yet.  You  go  on  back  to 
the  picnic.  Tell  them  I  wouldnt  come  back  because  my 
clothes  were  spoiled." 

"Look  here/'  he  said,  'What  are  you  up  to?" 

"Nothing,  I'm  all  right  You  and  Spoade  go  on  back. 
fll  see  you  tomorrow."  I  went  on  across  the  yard,  to- 
ward the  road. 

"Do  you  know  where  the  station  is?"  Shreve  said. 

Til  find  it  111  see  you  all  tomorrow.  Tell  Mrs  Bland 
Fin  sorry  I  spoiled  her  party."  They  stood  watching  me. 
I  went  around  the  house.  A  rock  path  went  down  to  the 
joad.  Roses  grew  on  both  sides  of  the  path.  I  went 
through  the  gate,  onto  the  road.  It  dropped  downhill,  to- 
ward the  woods,  and  I  could  make  out  the  auto  beside 
the  road.  I  went  up  the  Ml.  The  light  increased  as  I 
mounted,  and  before  I  reached  the  top  I  heard  a  car.  It 
Bounded  far  away  across  the  twilight  and  I  stopped  and 
listened  to  it  I  couldnt  make  out  the  auto  any  longer, 
but  Shreve  was  standing  in  the  road  before  the  house, 
looking  up  the  hill.  Behind  him  th^  yellow  light  lay  like 


THE     SOUKD     AND     THE     FITEY        I»7 

a  wash  of  paint  on  the  roof  of  the  house.  I  lifted  my 
hand  and  went  on  over  the  hill,  listening  to  the  car.  1  hen 
the  house  was  gone  and  I  stopped  in  the  green  and  yel- 
low light  and  heard  the  car  growing  louder  and  louder, 
until  just  as  it  began  to  die  away  it  ceased  all  together.  I 
waited  until  I  heard  it  start  again.  Then  I  went  on. 

As  I  descended  the  light  dwindled  slowly,  yet  at  the 
same  time  without  altering  its  quality,  as  if  I  and  not 
light  were  changing,  decreasing,  though  even  when  the 
road  ran  into  trees  you  could  have  read  a  newspaper. 
Pretty  soon  I  came  to  a  lane.  I  turned  into  it.  It  was 
^Joser  and  darker  than  the  road,  but  when  it  came  out  al 
Jae  trolley  stop — another  wooden  marquee — the  light 
was  still  unchanged.  After  the  lane  it  seemed  brighter,  as 
though  I  had  walked  through  night  in  the  lane  and  come 
out  into  morning  again.  Pretty  soon  the  car  came.  I  got 
on  it,  they  turning  to  look  at  my  eye,  and  found  a  seat  on 
the  left  side. 

The  lights  were  on  in  the  car,  so  while  we  ran  between 
trees  I  couldnt  see  anything  except  my  own  face  and  a 
woman  acros-s  the  aisle  with  a  hat  sitting  right  on  top  of 
her  head,  with  a  broken  feather  in  it,  but  when  we  ran 
©ut  of  the  trees  I  could  see  the  twilight  again,  that  qual- 
ity of  light  as  if  time  really  had  stopped  for  a  while,  with 
the  sun  hanging  just  under  the  horizon,  and  then  we 
passed  the  marquee  where  the  old  man  had  been  eating 
out  of  the  sack,  and  the  road  going  on  under  the  twilight, 
into  twilight  and  the  sense  of  water  peaceful  and  swift 
beyond.  Then  the  car  went  on,  the  draught  building 
steadily  up  in  the  open  door  until  it  was  drawing  steadily 
through  the  car  with  the  odour  of  summer  and  darkness 
except  honeysuckle.  Honeysuckle  was  the  saddest  odour 
of  all,  I  think.  I  remember  lots  of  them.  Wistaria  was  one. 
On  the  rainy  days  when  Mother  wasnt  feeling  quite  bad 


THE     SOUKB     ANB     THE     FUBY 

-enough,  to  stay  away  from  die  windows  we  used  to  play 
tinder  It  When  Mother  stayed  in  bed  Dllsey  would  put 
old  clothes  on  us  and  let  us  go  out  in  the  rain  because 
she  said  rain  never  hui-t  young  folks.  But  if  Mother  was 
•lip  we  always  began  by  playing  on  the  porch  until  she 
said  we  were  making  too  much  noise,  then  we  went  out 
and  played  under  the  wistaria  frame. 

This  was  where  I  saw  the  river  for  the  last  time  this 
morning,  about  here*  I  could  feel  water  beyond  the  twi- 
light, smell.  When  it  bloomed  in  the  spring  and  it  rained 
the  smell  was  everywhere  you  didnt  notice  it  so  much  at 
other  times  but  when  it  rained  the  smell  began  to  come 
Into  the  house  at  twilight  either  it  would  rain  more  at 
twilight  or  there  was  something  in  the  light  itself  but  it 
always  smelled  strongest  then  until  I  would  lie  in  bed 
thinking  when  will  it  stop  when  will  it  stop.  The  draft 
in  the  door  smelled  of  water,  a  damp  steady  breath. 
Sometimes  I  could  put  myself  to  sleep  saying  that  over 
and  over  until  after  the  honeysuckle  got  all  mixed  up  in 
it  the  whole  thing  came  to  symbolise  night  and  unrest 
1  seemed  to  be  lying  neither  asleep  nor  awake  looking 
down  a  long  corridor  of  grey  halflight  where  all  stable 
things  had  become  shadowy  paradoxical  all  I  had  done 
sliadows  all  I  had  felt  suffered  taking  visible  form  antic 
and  perverse  mocking  without  relevance  inherent  them.4 
selves  with  the  denial  of  the  significance  they  should  have 
affirmed  thinking  I  was  I  was  not  who  was  not  was  not 
who. 

I  could  smell  the  curves  of  the  river  beyond  the  dusk 
and  I  saw  the  last  light  supine  and  tranquil  upon  tide- 
flats  like  pieces  of  broken  mirror,  then  beyond  them 
lights  began  in  the  pale  clear  air,  trembling  a  little  like 
butterflies  hovering  a  long  way  off.  Benjamin  the  child 
of.  How  he  used  to  sit  before  that  mirror.  Refuge  un' 


THE     SOUND     AHB     THE     FURY        185 

failing  in  which  conflict  tempered  silenced  reconciled 
Benjamin  the  child  of  mine  old  age  held  hostage  into 
Egypt.  O  Benjamin.  Dilsey  said  it  was  because  Mother 
was  too  proud  for  him.  They  come  into  white  people's 
lives  like  that  in  sudden  sharp  black  trickles  that  isolate 
white  facts  for  an  instant  in  unarguable  truth  like  undei 
a  microscope;  the  rest  of  the  time  just  voices  that  laugh 
when  you  see  nothing  to  laugh  at,  tears  when  no  reason 
for  tears.  They  will  bet  on  the  odd  or  even  number  of 
mourners  at  a  funeral.  A  brothel  full  of  them  in  Memphis 
went  into  a  religious  trance  ran  naked  into  the  street.  It 
took  three  policemen  to  subdue  one  of  them.  Yes  Jesus 

0  good  man  Jesus  O  that  good  man. 

The  car  stopped,  I  got  out,  with  them  looking  at  my 
eye.  When  the  trolley  came  it  was  full.  I  stopped  on  the 
back  platform. 

"Seats  up  front/'  the  conductor  said.  I  looked  into  the 
car.  There  were  no  seats  on  the  left  side.  , 

"I'm  not  going  far/*  I  said.  "Ill  just  stand  here." 

We  crossed  the  river.  The  bridge,  that  is,  arching  slow 
and  high  into  space,  between  silence  and  nothingness 
where  lights — yellow  and  red  and  green — trembled  in 
the  clear  air,  repeating  themselves. 

"Better  go  up  front  and  get  a  seat/'  the  conductor  said. 

"I  get  off  pretty  soon/'  I  said.  "A  couple  of  blocks/* 

I  got  off  before  we  reached  the  postoffice.  They'd  all 
be  sitting  around  somewhere  by  now  though,  and  then 

1  was  hearing  my  watch  and  I  began  to  listen  for  the 
chimes  and  I  touched  Shreve's  letter  through  my  coat, 
the  bitten  shadows  of  the  elms  flowing  upon  my  hand. 
And  then  as  I  turned  into  the  quad  the  chimes  did  begin 
and  I  went  on  while  the  notes  came  up  like  ripples  on  a 
pool  and  passed  me  and  went  on,  saying  Quarter  to 
what?  All  right.  Quarter  to  what 


19°        THE     8OUK"B     AND     THE     FTJUY 

Our  windows  were  dark.  The  entrance  was  empty.  I 
walked  close  to  the  left  wall  when  I  entered,  but  it  was 
empty;  just  the  stairs  curving  up  into  shadows  echoes  of 
feet  in  lie  sad  generations  like  light  dust  upon  the  shad- 
ows, my  feet  waking  them  like  dust,  lightly  to  settle 
again. 

I  could  see  the  letter  before  I  turned  the  light  on, 
propped  against  a  book  on  the  table  so  I  would  see  it 
Calling  him  my  husband.  And  then  Spoade  said  they 
were  going  somewhere,  would  not  be  back  until  late, 
and  Mrs  Bland  would  need  another  cavalier.  But  I  would 
have  seen  him  and  he  cannot  get  another  car  for  an  hour 
because  after  six  oclock.  I  took  out  my  watch  and  lis- 
tened to  it  clicking  away,  not  knowing  it  couldnt  even 
lie.  Then  I  laid  it  face  up  on  the  table  and  took  Mrs 
Eland's  letter  and  tore  it  acioss  and  dropped  the  pieces 
into  the  waste  basket  and  took  off  my  coat,  vest,  collar. 
tie  and  shirt.  The  tie  was  spoiled  too,  but  then  niggers0 
Maybe  a  pattern  of  blood  he  could  call  that  the  one 
Christ  was  wearing.  I  found  the  gasoline  in  Shreve's  room 
and  spread  the  vest  on  the  table,  where  it  would  be  flat, 
and  opened  the  gasoline. 

the  first  car  in  town  a  girl  Girl  thafs  what  Jason 
couldnt  bear  smett  of  gasoline  making  him  sick  then  g®$ 
madder  than  ever  because  a  girl  Girl  had  no  sister  but 
Benjamin  Benjamin  the  child  of  my  sorrowful  if  I'd  ju$t 
had  a  mother  so  I  could  say  Mother  Mother  It  took  a  lot 
of  gasoline,  and  then  I  couldnt  tell  if  it  was  still  the  stain 
or  just  the  gasoline.  It  had  started  the  cut  to  smarting 
again  so  when  I  went  to  wash  I  hung  the  vest  on  a  chair 
and  lowered  the  light  cord  so  that  the  bulb  would  be 
drying  the  splotch.  I  washed  my  face  and  hands,  but 
even  then  I  could  smell  it  within  the  soap  stinging,  con- 
stricting the  nostrils  a  little.  Then  I  opened  the  bag  and 


THE     SOTTED     A1STB     THE     FCJBY        19 1 

took  the  shirt  and  collar  and  tie  out  and  put  the  bloody 
ones  in  and  closed  the  bag,  and  dressed.  WMle  I  was 
brushing  my  hair  the  half  hour  went  But  there  was  until 
the  three  quarters  anyway,  except  suppose  seeing  oil  the 
pushing  darkness  only  his  own  face  no  broken  feather  tm~ 
less  two  of  them  but  not  two  like  that  going  to  Bottom 
the  same  night  then  my  face  his  face  for  an  instant  across 
the  crashing  when  out  of  darkness  two  lighted  windows 
in  rigid  fleeing  crash  gone  his  face  and  mine  just  I  sm 
saw  did  I  see  not  goodbye  the  marqt^ee  empty  of  eatmg 
the  road  empty  in  darkness  in  sdence  the  bridge  arching 
mto  silence  darkness  sleep  the  water  peaceful  and  swift 
not  goodbye 

I  turned  out  the  light  and  went  into  my  bedroom,  out 
of  the  gasoline  but  I  could  still  smell  it.  I  stood  at  the 
window  the  curtains  moved  slow  out  of  the  darkness 
touching  my  face  like  someone  breathing  asleep,  breath- 
ing slow  into  the  darkness  again,  leaving  the  touch.  Aftef 
they  had  gone  up  stairs  Mother  lay  back  in  her  chaw,  the 
camphor  handkerchief  to  her  mouth.  Father  hadnt 
moved  he  still  sat  beside  her  holding  her  hand  the  bei* 
lowing  hammering  away  like  no  place  far  U  in  silence 
When  I  was  little  there  was  a  picture  in  one  of  our  books, 
a  dark  place  into  which  a  single  weak  ray  of  light  came 
slanting  upon  two  faces  lifted  out  of  the  shadow.  You 
know  what  Fd  do  if  1  were  King?  she  never  was  a  queea 
or  a  fairy  she  was  always  a  king  or  a  giant  or  a  general 
rd  break  that  place  open  and  drag  them  out  and  Fd 
whip  them  good  It  was  torn  out,  Jagged  out.  I  was  glad. 
Fd  have  to  turn  back  to  it  until  the  dungeon  was 
Mother  herself  she  and  Father  upward  into  weak  light 
holding  hands  and  us  lost  somewhere  below  even  them 
without  even  a  ray  of  light  Then  the  honeysuckle  got 
into  it  As  soon  as  I  turned  off  the  light  and  tried  to  go  to 


THE     SOITHD     A2STB     THE     FUKY 

sleep  It  would  begin  to  come  into  the  room  in  waves 
building  and  building  up  until  I  would  have  to  pant  to 
get  any  air  at  all  out  of  it  until  I  would  have  to  get  up 
and  feel  my  way  like  when  I  was  a  little  boy  hands  can 
see  touching  in  the  mind  shaping  unseen  door  Door  now 
nothing  hands  can  see  My  nose  could  see  gasoline,  the 
vest  on  the  table,  the  door.  The  corridor  was  still  empty 
of  all  the  feet  in  sad  generations  seeking  water,  yet  the 
eyes  unseeing  clenched  like  teeth  not  disbelieving  doubt- 
ing even  the  absence  of  pain  shin  ankle  knee  the  long  in- 
visible flowing  of  the  stair-railing  where  a  misstep  in  th$ 
darkness  filled  with  sleeping  Mother  Father  Caddy  Jason 
Maury  door  I  am  not  afraid  only  Mother  Father  Caddy 
Jason  Maury  getting  so  far  ahead  sleeping  I  will  sleep 
fast  when  I  door  Door  door  It  was  empty  too,  the  pipes, 
the  porcelain,  the  stained  quiet  walls,  the  throne  of  con- 
templation, I  had  forgotten  the  glass,  but  I  could  hands 
can  see  cooling  fingers  invisible  swan-throat  where  less 
than  Moses  rod  the  glass  touch  tentative  not  to  drum- 
ming lean  cool  throat  drumming  cooling  the  metal  the 
glass  fuE  overfutt  cooling  the  glass  the  fingers  flushing 
deep  leaving  the  taste  of  dampened  sleep  in  the  long  si- 
lence of  the  throat  I  returned  up  the  corridor,  waking  the 
lost  feet  in  whispering  battalions  in  the  silence,  into  the 
gasoline,  the  watch  telling  its  furious  lie  on  the  dark 
table.  Then  the  curtains  breathing  out  of  the  dark  upon 
my  face,  leaving  the  breathing  upon  my  face.  A  quarter 
hour  yet.  And  then  I'll  not  be.  The  peacefulest  words. 
Peacefulest  words.  Non  fuL  Sum.  Fui.  Non  sum.  Some- 
where I  heard  bells  once.  Mississippi  or  Massachusetts.  I 
was.  I  am  not.  Massachusetts  or  Mississippi.  Shreve  has  a 
bottle  in  his  trunk,  Arent  you  even  going  to  open  it  Mr 
and  Mrs  Jason  Richmond  Gompson  announce  the  Three 
times.  Days.  Arent  you  even  gatnp  to  open  it  marriage  of 


THE     SOUISTD     AND     THE     FURY 

their  daughter  Candace  that  liquor  teaches  you  to  con* 
fuse  the  means  with  the  end,  I  am.  Drink.  I  was  not  Let 
us  seU  Benjy's  pasture  so  that  Quentin  may  go  to  Har- 
vard and  I  may  knock  my  bones  together  and  togetner.  I 
will  be  dead  in.  Was  it  one  year  Caddy  said.  Shrev,  ~  lias  a 
bottle  in  his  trunk.  Sir  I  will  not  need  Shreve's  I  have  sold 
Benjy's  pasture  and  I  can  be  dead  in  Harvard  Caddy 
said  in  the  caverns  and  the  grottoes  of  the  sea  tumbling 
peacefully  to  the  wavering  tides  because  Harvard  is  such 
a  fine  sound  forty  acres  is  no  high  price  for  a  fine  sound, 
A  fine  dead  sound  we  will  swap  Benjy's  pasture  for  a  fine 
dead  sound.  It  will  last  him  a  long  time  because  he  can- 
not hear  it  unless  he  can  smell  it  as  soon  as  she  came  in 
the  door  he  began  to  cry  I  thought  all  the  time  it  was 
just  one  of  those  town  squirts  that  Father  was  always 
teasing  her  about  until.  I  didnt  notice  him  any  more  than 
any  other  stranger  drummer  or  what  thought  they  were 
army  shirts  until  all  of  a  sudden  I  knew  he  wasn't  think- 
ing of  me  at  all  as  a  potential  source  of  harm,  but  was 
thinking  of  her  when  he  looked  at  me  was  looking  at  me 
through  her  like  through  a  piece  of  coloured  glass  why 
must  you  meddle  with  me  dont  you  know  it  wont  do  any 
good  I  thought  youd  have  left  that  for  Mother  and 
Jason 

did  Mother  set  Jason  to  spy  on  you  I  wouldnt  have. 

Women  only  use  other  people's  codes  of  honour  it's  be- 
cause she  loves  Caddy  staying  downstairs  even  when  she 
was  sick  so  Father  couldnt  kid  Uncle  Maury  before  Ja- 
son Father  said  Uncle  Maury  was  too  poor  a  classicist 
to  risk  the  blind  immortal  boy  in  person  he  should  have 
chosen  Jason  because  Jason  would  have  made  only  the 
same  kind  of  blunder  Uncle  Maury  himself  would  have 
made  not  one  to  get  Him  a  black  eye  the  Patterson  boy 
was  smaller  than  Jason  too  they  sold  the  kites  for  a  nickel 


194        THE     SOUXD     AND     THE     FURY 

apiece  until  the  trouble  over  finances  Jason  got  a  new 
partner  still  smaller  one  small  enough  anyway  because 
T.  P.  said  Jason  still  treasurer  but  Father  said  why  should 
Uncle  Maury  work  if  he  father  could  support  five  or  six 
niggers  that  did  nothing  at  all  but  sit  with  their  feet  in 
the  oven  he  certainly  could  board  and  lodge  Uncle 
Maury  now  and  then  and  lend  him  a  little  money  who 
kept  his  Father's  belief  in  the  celestial  derivation  of  his 
own  species  at  such  a  fine  heat  then  Mother  would  cry 
and  say  that  Father  believed  his  people  were  better  than 
hers  that  he  was  ridiculing  Uncle  Maury  to  teach  us  the 
same  thing  she  couldnt  see  that  Father  was  teaching  us 
that  all  men  are  just  accumulations  dolls  stuffed  with 
sawdust  swept  up  from  th^  trash  heaps  where  all  pre- 
vious dolls  had  been  thrown  away  the  sawdust  flowing 
from  what  wound  in  what  side  that  not  for  me  died  not, 
It  used  to  be  I  thought  of  death  as  a  man  something  like 
Grandfather  a  friend  of  his  a  kind  of  private  and  par- 
ticular friend  like  we  used  to  think  of  Grandfather's  desk 
not  to  touch  it  not  even  to  talk  loud  in  the  room  where  it 
was  I  always  thought  of  them  as  being  together  some- 
where all  th©  time  waiting  for  old  Colonel  Sartoris  to 
come  down  and  sit  with  them  waiting  on  a  high  nlace  be- 
yond cedar  trees  Colonel  Sartoris  was  on  a  still  higher 
place  looking  out  across  at  something  and  they  were 
waiting  for  him  to  get  done  looking  at  it  and  come  down 
Grandfather  wore  his  uniform  and  we  could  hear  the 
murmur  of  their  voices  from  beyond  the  cedars  they  were 
always  talking  and  Grandfather  was  always  right. 

The  three  quarters  began.  The  first  note  sounded, 
measured  and  tranquil,  serenely  peremptory,  emptying 
the  unhurried  silence  for  the  next  one  and  that's  it  if  peo- 
ple could  only  change  one  another  forever  that  way 
merge  like  a  flame  swirling  up  for  an  instant  then  blown 


THE     SOUISrD     AKB     THE     FURY 

cleanly  out  along  the  cool  eternal  dark  instead  of  lying 
there  trying  not  to  think  of  the  swing  until  all  cedars 
came  to  have  that  vivid  dead  smell  of  perfume  that 
Benjy  hated  so.  Just  by  imagining  the  clump  It  seemed  to 
me  that  I  could  hear  whispers  secret  surges  smell  the 
beating  of  hot  blood  under  wild  unsecret  flesh  watching 
against  red  eyelids  the  swine  un tethered  in  pairs  rushing 
coupled  into  the  sea  and  lie  we  must  just  stay  awake 
and  see  evil  done  for  a  little  while  its  not  always  and  i  it 
doesnt  have  to  be  even  that  long  for  a  man  of  courage 
and  he  do  you  consider  that  courage  and  i  yes  sir  dont 
you  and  lie  every  man  is  the  arbiter  of  his  own  virtues 
whether  or  not  you  consider  it  courageous  is  of  more  im- 
portance than  tie  act  itself  than  any  act  otherwise  you 
could  not  be  in  earnest  and  i  you  dont  believe  i  am  seri- 
ous and  he  i  think  you  are  too  serious  to  give  me  any 
cause  for  alarm  you  wouldnt  have  felt  driven  to  the  ex- 
pedient of  telling  me  you  have  committed  incest  other- 
wise and  i  i  wasnt  lying  i  wasnt  lying  and  he  you  wanted 
to  sublimate  a  piece  of  natural  human  folly  into  a  horror 
and  then  exorcise  it  with  truth  and  i  it  was  to  isolate  her 
out  of  the  loud  world  so  that  it  would  have  to  flee  us  of 
necessity  and  then  the  sound  of  it  would  be  as  though  it 
had  never  been  and  he  did  you  try  to  make  her  do  it  and 
i  i  was  afraid  to  i  was  afraid  she  might  and  then  it 
wouldnt  have  done  any  good  but  if  i  could  tell  you  we 
did  it  would  have  been  so  and  then  the  others  wouldnt 
be  so  and  then  the  world  would  roar  away  and  he  and 
now  this  other  you  are  not  lying  now  either  but  you  are 
still  blind  to  what  is  in  yourself  to  that  part  of  general 
truth  the  sequence  of  natural  events  and  their  causes 
which  shadows  every  mans  brow  even  benjys  you  are  not 
thinking  of  finitude  you  are  contemplating  an  apotheosis 
in  which  a  temporary  state  of  mind  will  become 


THE     SOUND     A^"D     THE     FURY 

symmetrical  above  the  flesh,  and  aware  both  of  itself  and 
of  the  flesh  it  will  not  quite  discard  you  will  not  even  be 
dead  and  i  temporary  and  he  you  cannot  bear  to  think 
that  someday  it  will  no  longer  hurt  you  like  this  now 
were  getting  at  it  you  seem  to  regard  it  merely  as  an  ex- 
perience that  will  whiten  your  hair  overnight  so  to  speak 
without  altering  your  appearance  at  all  you  wont  do  it 
under  these  conditions  it  will  be  a  gamble  and  tibe 
strange  thing  is  that  man  who  is  conceived  by  accident 
and  whose  every  breath  is  a  fresh  cast  with  dice  already 
loaded  against  him  will  not  face  that  final  main  which  he 
knows  before  hand  he  has  assuredly  to  face  without  es- 
saying expedients  ranging  all  the  way  from  violence  to 
petty  chicanery  that  would  not  deceive  a  child  until 
someday  in  very  disgust  he  risks  everything  on  a  single 
blind  turn  of  a  card  no  man  ever  does  that  under  the  first 
fury  of  despair  or  remorse  or  bereavement  he  does  it 
only  when  he  has  realised  that  even  the  despair  or  re- 
morse or  bereavement  is  not  particularly  important  to  the 
dark  diceman  and  i  temporary  and  he  it  is  hard  believing 
to  think  that  a  love  or  a  sorrow  is  a  bond  purchased  with- 
out design  and  which  matures  willynilly  and  is  recalled 
without  warning  to  be  replaced  by  whatever  issue  the 
gods  happen  to  be  floating  at  the  time  no  you  will  not 
do  that  until  you  come  to  believe  that  even  she  was  not 
quite  worth  despair  perhaps  and  i  i  will  never  do  that 
nobody  knows  what  i  know  and  he  i  think  youd  better 
go  on  up  to  Cambridge  right  away  you  might  go  up  into 
maine  for  a  month  you  can  afford  it  if  you  are  careful  it 
might  be  a  good  thing  watching  pennies  has  healed  more 
scars  than  jesus  and  i  suppose  i  realise  what  you  believe  i 
will  realise  up  there  next  week  or  next  month  and  he 
then  you  will  remember  that  for  you  to  go  to  harvard 
has  been  your  mothers  dream  since  you  were  born  and 


THE     SOUND     AND    THE     FUEY       197 

no  compson  lias  ever  disappointed  a  lady  and  i  tempo- 
rary it  will  be  better  for  me  for  all  of  us  and  he  every 
man  is  the  arbiter  of  his  own  virtues  but  let  no  man  pre- 
scribe for  another  mans  wellbeing  and  i  temporary  and 
he  was  the  saddest  word  of  all  there  is  nothing  else  in  the 
world  its  not  despair  until  time  its  not  even  time  until 
it  was 

The  last  note  sounded.  At  last  it  stopped  vibrating  and 
the  darkness  was  still  again.  I  entered  the  sitting  room 
and  turned  on  the  light.  I  put  my  vest  on.  The  gasoline 
was  faint  now,  barely  noticeable,  and  in  the  mirror  the 
stain  didnt  show.  Not  like  my  eye  did,  anyway.  I  put  on 
my  coat.  Shreve's  letter  crackled  through  the  cloth  and  I 
took  it  out  and  examined  the  address,  and  put  it  in  my 
side  pocket.  Then  I  carried  the  watch  into  Shreve's  room 
and  put  it  in  his  drawer  and  went  to  my  room  and  got 
a  fresh  handkerchief  and  went  to  the  door  and  put  my 
hand  on  the  light  switch.  Then  I  remembered  I  hadnt 
brushed  my  teeth,  so  I  had  to  open  the  bag  again.  I 
found  my  toothbrush  and  got  some  of  Shreve's  paste  and 
went  out  and  brushed  my  teeth,  I  squeezed  the  brush  as 
dry  as  I  could  and  put  it  back  in  the  bag  and  shut  it, 
and  went  to  the  door  again.  Before  I  snapped  the 
light  out  I  looked  around  to  see  if  there  was  anything 
else,  then  I  saw  that  I  had  forgotten  my  hat.  I'd  have  to 
go  by  the  postoffice  and  I'd  be  sure  to  meet  some  of  them, 
and  they'd  think  I  was  a  Harvard  Square  student  making 
like  he  was  a  senior.  I  had  forgotten  to  brush  it  too,  but 
Shreve  had  a  brush,  so  I  didnt  have  to  open  the  bag  any 
more. 


APRIL 

6 

1928 


ONCE  A  BITCH  ALWAYS  A  BITCH,  WHAT  I  SAY.  I  SAYS 
you're  lucky  if  her  playing  out  of  school  is  all  that 
worries  you.  I  says  she  ought  to  be  down  there  in  that 
kitchen  right  now,  instead  of  up  there  in  her  room,  gob- 
bing paint  on  her  face  and  waiting  for  six  niggers  that 
cant  even  stand  up  out  of  a  chair  unless  they've  got  a 
pan  full  of  bread  and  meat  to  balance  them,  to  fix  break- 
fast for  her.  And  Mother  says, 

"But  to  have  the  school  authorities  tihink  that  I  have 
no  control  over  her,  that  I  cant — " 

<cWell,"  I  says,  **You  cant,  can  you?  You  never  have 
tried  to  do  anything  with  her,"  I  says,  "How  do  you  ex- 
pect to  begin  this  late,  when  she's  seventeen  years  old?*9 

She  thought  about  that  for  a  while. 

"But  to  have  them  think  that  ...  I  didn't  even  know 
she  had  a  report  card.  She  told  me  last  fall  that  they  had 
quit  using  them  this  year.  And  now  for  Professor  Junkin 
to  call  me  on  the  telephone  and  tell  me  if  she's  absent 
one  more  time,  she  will  have  to  leave  school.  How  does 
she  do  it?  Where  does  she  go?  You're  down  town  all  day; 
you  ought  to  see  her  if  she  stays  on  the  streets.*" 

198 


THE     SOUND      AND     THE     FURT 

"Yes,"  I  says,  "If  she  stayed  on  the  streets.  I  dont  reckon 
she'd  be  playing  out  of  school  just  to  do  something  she 
could  do  in  public/'  I  says. 

"What  do  you  mean?"  she  says. 

"I  dont  mean  anything,"  I  says.  "I  Just  answered  your 
question."  Then  she  begun  to  cry  again,  talking  about 
how  her  own  flesh  and  blood  rose  up  to  curse  her 

"You  asked  me/'  I  says. 

"I  dont  mean  you/*  she  says.  "You  are  the  only  one  of 
them  that  isn't  a  reproach  to  me/' 

"Sure/*  I  says,  "I  never  had  tune  to  be.  I  never  had 
time  to  go  to  Harvard  like  Quentin  or  drink  myself  into 
the  ground  like  Father.  I  had  to  work.  But  of  course  if 
you  want  me  to  follow  her  around  and  see  what  she  does, 
I  can  quit  the  store  and  get  a  job  where  I  can  work  at 
night.  Then  I  can  watch  her  during  the  day  and  you  can 
use  Ben  for  the  night  shift." 

**I  know  I'm  just  a  trouble  and  a  burden  to  you/'  ske 
says,  crying  on  the  pillow. 

"I  ought  to  know  it,"  I  says.  "You've  been  telling  me 
that  for  thirty  years.  Even  Ben  ought  to  know  it  now.  Do 
you  want  me  to  say  anything  to  her  about  it?" 

"Do  you  think  it  will  do  any  good?''  she  says. 

"Not  if  you  come  down  there  interfering  just  when  I 
get  started/*  I  says.  "If  you  want  me  to  control  her?  just 
say  so  and  keep  your  hands  off.  Everytime  I  try  to,  you 
come  butting  in  and  then  she  gives  both  of  us  the  laugh.** 

"Remember  she's  your  own  flesh  and  blood/*  she  says. 

"Sure/*  I  says,  "that's  just  what  I'm  thinking  of — flesh. 
And  a  little  blood  too,  if  I  had  my  way.  When  people  act 
like  niggers,  no  matter  who  they  are  the  only  thing  to 
do  is  treat  them  like  a  nigger." 

"I'm  afraid  you'll  lose  your  temper  with  her,"  she  says. 

"Well,"  I  says,  "You  haven't  had  much  luck  with  your 


200        THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FURY 

system.  You  want  me  to  do  anything  about  it,  or  not? 
Say  one  way  or  the  other;  I've  got  to  get  on  to  work/' 

"I  know  you  have  to  slave  your  life  away  for  us,"  she 
says.  "You  know  if  I  had  my  way,  you'd  have  an  office  of 
your  own  to  go  to,  and  hours  that  became  a  Bascomb, 
Because  you  are  a  Bascomb,  despite  your  name.  I  know 
that  if  your  father  could  have  foreseen — " 

'Well/7  I  says,  "I  reckon  he's  entitled  to  guess  wrong 
now  and  then,  like  anybody  else,  even  a  Smith  or  a 
Jones/*  She  begun  to  cry  again. 

To  hear  you  speak  bitterly  of  your  dead  father,"  she 
says. 

"All  right/*  I  says,  "all  right.  Have  it  your  way.  But  as 
I  haven't  got  an  office,  I'll  have  to  get  on  to  what  I  have 
got.  Do  you  want  me  to  say  anything  to  her?" 

"I'm  afraid  you'll  lose  your  temper  with  her,"  she  says. 

"All  right,"  I  says,  "I  wont  say  anything,  then." 

"But  something  must  be  done,"  she  says.  "To  have  peo- 
ple think  I  permit  her  to  stay  out  of  school  and  run  about 
the  streets,  or  that  I  cant  prevent  her  doing  it.  ...  Jason, 
Jason,"  she  says,  "How  could  you.  How  could  you  leave 
me  with  these  burdens." 

"Now,  now,"  I  says,  "You'll  make  yourself  sick.  Why 
dont  you  either  lock  her  up  all  day  too,  or  turn  her  over 
to  me  and  quit  worrying  over  her?" 

"My  own  flesh  and  blood,"  she  says,  crying.  So  I  says, 

"All  right,  I'll  tend  to  her.  Quit  crying,  now." 

"Dont  lose  your  temper,"  she  says.  "She's  just  a  child, 
remember." 

"No,"  I  says,  "I  wont."  I  went  out,  closing  the  door. 

"Jason,"  she  says.  I  didn't  answer.  I  went  down  the 
hall.  "Jason,"  she  says  beyond  the  door.  I  went  on  down 
stairs.  There  wasn't  anybody  in  the  diningroom,  then  I 


THE     SOUND     AHB     THE     FTJKY        201 

heard  her  in  the  kitchen.  She  was  trying  to  make  Dilsej 
let  her  have  another  cup  of  coffee.  I  went  in. 

"I  reckon  that's  your  school  costume,  is  it?"  I  says.  "Or 
maybe  today's  a  holiday?" 

"Just  a  half  a  cup,  Dilsey/'  she  says.  "Please." 

"No,  suh,"  Dilsey  says,  "I  aint  gwine  do  it.  You  aint  got 
no  business  wid  mo'n  one  cup,  a  seventeen  year  old  gal, 
let  lone  whut  Miss  Cahline  say.  You  go  on  and  git 
dressed  for  school,  so  you  kin.  ride  to  town  wid  Jason. 
You  fixin  to  be  late  again/* 

"No  she's  not,"  I  says.  "We're  going  to  fix  that  right 
now."  She  looked  at  me,  the  cup  in  her  hand.  She 
brushed  her  hair  back  from  her  face,  her  kimono  slipping 
off  her  shoulder.  "You  put  that  cup  down  and  come  in 
here  a  minute,"  I  says. 

"What  for?"   she    says. 

"Come  on,"  I  says.  "Put  that  cup  in  the  sink  and  come 
in  here." 

"What  you  up  to  now,  Jason?"  Dilsey  says. 

"You  may  think  you  can  run  over  me  like  you  do  your 
grandmother  and  everybody  else,"  I  says,  "But  youll  find 
out  different.  I'll  give  you  ten  seconds  to  put  that  cup 
down  like  I  told  you." 

She  quit  looking  at  me.  She  looked  at  Dilsey.  'What 
time  is  it,  Dilsey?"  she  says.  "When  it's  ten  seconds,  you 
whistle.  Just  a  half  a  cup,  Dilsey,  pi — " 

I  grabbed  her  by  the  arm.  She  dropped  the  cup.  It 
broke  on  the  floor  and  she  jerked  back,  looking  at  me, 
but  I  held  her  arm.  Dilsey  got  up  from  her  chair. 

"You,  Jason,"  she  says, 

"You  turn  me  loose/'  Quentin  says,  Til  slap  you." 

"You  will,  will  you?"  I  says,  "You  will  will  yoii?"  She 
slapped  at  me.  I  caught  that  hand  too  and  held  her  like 


102         THE     SOUKD     ANB     TBCE     FUBY 

a  wildcat  'You  will,  will  yon?"  I  says.  "You  think  you 

will?" 

Ton,  Jason!7*  Dilsey  says.  I  dragged  her  into  the  din- 
ingroom.  Her  kimono  came  unfastened,,  flapping  about 
her;  damn  near  naked.  Dilsey  came  hobbling  along.  I 
tamed  and  kicked  the  door  shut  in  her  face. 

"You  keep  out  of  here,"  I  says. 

Quentin  was  leaning  against  the  table,  fastening  her 
kimono.  I  looked  at  her. 

"Now,"  I  says,  "I  want  to  know  what  you  mean,  play- 
ing out  of  school  and  telling  your  grandmother  lies  and 
forging  her  name  on  your  report  and  worrying  her  sick. 
What  do  you  mean  by  it?" 

She  didn't  say  anything.  She  was  fastening  her  kimono 
up  under  her  chin,  pulling  it  tight  around  her,  looking  at 
me.  She  hadn't  got  around  to  painting  herself  yet  and 
her  face  looked  like  she  had  polished  it  with  a  gun  rag.  I 
went  and  grabbed  her  wrist.  "What  do  you  mean?"  I 
says. 

"None  of  your  damn  business/*  she  says.  "You  turn  me 

loose.'* 

Dilsey  came  in  the  door.  "You,  Jason/*  she  says. 

"You  get  out  of  here,  like  I  told  you/'  I  says,  not  even 
looking  back.  "I  want  to  know  where  you  go  when  you 
play  out  of  school,"  I  says.  "You  keep  off  the  streets,  or 
I'd  see  you.  Who  do  you  play  out  with?  Are  you  hiding 
out  in  the  woods  with  one  of  those  damn  slick-headed 
jellybeans?  Is  that  where  you  go?" 

*You — you.  old  goddamn!"  she  says.  She  fought,  but  I 
held  her.  "You  damn  old  goddamn!'"  she  says. 

"Til  show  you/*  I  says.  "You  may  cai*  scare  an  old 
woman  off,  but  I'll  show  you  who's  got  hold  of  you  now/' 
I  held  her  with  one  hand,  then  she  quit  fighting  and 
watched  me,  her  eyes  getting  wide  and  black. 


THE     SOTJ^D     AND     THE     FIJBY        203 

**What  are  you  going  to  do?"  she  says. 

**You  wait  until  I  get  this  belt  out  and  111  show  you/' 
I  says,  pulling  my  belt  out.  Then  Dilsey  grabbed  my  arm. 

"Jason,"  she  says,  "You,  Jasonl  Aint  you  shamed  of 
yourself." 

"Dilsey,"  Quentin  says,  "Dilsey." 

"I  aint  gwine  let  him,"  Dilsey  says,  "Dont  you  worry, 
honey."  She  held  to  iny  aim.  Then  the  belt  came  out 
and  I  jerked  loose  and  flung  her  away.  She  stumbled  into 
the  table.  She  was  so  old  she  couldn't  do  any  more  than 
move  hardly.  But  that's  all  right:  we  need  somebody  in 
the  kitchen  to  eat  up  the  grub  the  young  ones  cant  tote 
off.  She  came  hobbling  between  us,  trying  to  hold  me 
again.  "Hit  me,  den,"  she  says,  "e£  nothin  else  but  hittin 
somebody  wont  do  you.  Hit  me,"  she  says. 

"Yon  think  I  wont?"  I  says. 

"I  dont  put  no  devilment  beyond  you,"  she  says.  Then 
I  heard  Mother  on  the  stairs.  I  might  have  known  she 
wasn't  going  to  keep  out  of  it.  I  let  go.  She  stumbled 
back  against  the  wall,  holding  her  kimono  shut. 

"All  right,"  I  says,  "Well  just  put  this  off  a  while.  But 
dont  think  you  can  run  it  over  me.  I'm  not  an  old  woman, 
nor  an  old  half  dead  nigger,  either.  You  damn  little  slut,** 
I  says. 

"Dilsey,"  she  says,  "Dilsey,  I  want  my  mother." 

Dilsey  went  to  her.  "Now,  now,"  she  says,  "He  aint 
gwine  so  much  as  lay  his  hand  on  you  while  Ise  here.*" 
Mother  came  on  down  the  stairs. 

"Jason,"  she  says,  "Dilsey." 

"Now,  now,"  Dilsey  says,  "I  aint  gwine  let  him  tech 
you."  She  put  her  hand  on  Quentin.  She  knocked  it 
down. 

"You  damn  old  nigger,"  she  says.  She  ran  toward 
door. 


204        THE     SOUISTB     AND     THE 

"Dilsey/'  Mother  says  on  the  stairs.  Quentin  ran  up  the 
stairs,  passing  her.  "Quentin,"  Mother  says,  "You,  Quen- 
tin/'  Quentin  ran  on.  1  could  hear  her  when  she  reached 
the  top,  then  in  the  hall.  Then  the  door  slammed. 

Mother  had  stopped.  Then  she  came  on.  "Dilsey/*  she 
says. 

"All  right/'  Dilsey  says,  *lse  comin.  You  go  on  and  git 
dat  car  and  wait  now,"  she  says,  "so  you  kin  cahy  her  to 
school." 

"Dont  you  worry,"  I  says.  Til  take  her  to  school  and 
Tm  going  to  see  that  she  stays  there.  I've  started  this 
thing,  and  I'm  going  through  with  it." 

"Jason,"  Mother  says  on  the  stairs. 

"Go  on,  now,"  Dilsey  says,  going  toward  the  door.  "You 
want  to  git  her  started  too?  Ise  comin,  Miss  Cahline." 

I  went  on  out.  I  could  hear  them  on  the  steps.  "You  go 
on  back  to  bed  now,"  Dilsey  was  saying,  "Dont  you 
know  you  aint  feeling  well  enough  to  git  up  yet?  Go  on 
back,  now.  Fm  gwine  to  see  she  gits  to  school  in  time." 

I  went  on  out  the  back  to  back  the  car  out,  then  I 
had  to  go  all  the  way  round  to  the  front  before  I  found 
them. 

"I  thought  I  told  you  to  put  that  tire  on  the  back  of 
the  car/'  I  says. 

"I  aint  had  time,"  Luster  says.  "Aint  nobody  to  watch 
him  till  mammy  git  done  in  de  kitchen." 

"Yes,"  I  says,  "I  feed  a  whole  damn  kitchen  full  of  nig- 
gers to  follow  around  after  him,  but  if  I  want  an  automo- 
bile tire  changed,  I  have  to  do  it  myself." 

"I  aint  had  nobody  to  leave  him  wid,"  he  says.  Then 
he  begun  moaning  and  slobbering. 

"Take  him  on  round  to  the  back,"  I  says.  "What  the 
hell  makes  you  want  to  keep  him  around  here  where  peo- 
ple can  see  him?"  I  made  them  go  on,  before  he  got 


SOUND     AXD     THE      FUKY 

started  bellowing  good.  It's  bad  enough  on  Sundays,  with 
that  damn  field  full  of  people  that  haven't  got  a  side 
show  and  six  niggers  to  feed,  knocking  a  damn  oversize 
mothball  around.  He's  going  to  keep  on  running  up  and 
down  that  fence  and  bellowing  every  time  they  come  in 
sight  until  first  thing  I  know  they're  going  to  begin 
charging  me  golf  dues,  then  Mother  and  Dilseyll  have  t<T 
get  a  couple  of  china  door  knobs  and  a  walking  stick 
and  work  It  out,  unless  I  play  at  night  with  a  lantern. 
Then  they'd  send  us  all  to  Jackson,  maybe.  God  knows, 
they'd  hold  Old  Home  week  when  that  happened. 

I  went  on  back  to  the  garage.  There  was  the  tire,  lean- 
ing against  the  wall,  but  be  damned  if  I  was  going  to  put 
it  on.  I  backed  out  and  turned  around.  She  was  standing 
by  the  drive.  I  says, 

"I  know  you  haven't  got  any  books:  I  just  want  to  ask 
you  what  you  did  with  them,  if  it's  any  of  my  business. 
Of  course  I  haven't  got  any  right  to  ask,"  I  says,  "I'm  just 
the  one  that  paid  $11.65  for  them  last  September." 

"Mother  buys  my  books,"  she  says.  'There's  not  a  cent 
of  your  money  on  me.  I'd  starve  first." 

"Yes?"  I  says.  <4You  tell  your  grandmother  that  and  see 
what  she  says.  You  dont  look  all  the  way  naked,"  I  sayss 
"even  if  that  stuff  on  your  face  does  hide  more  of  you 
than  anything  else  you've  got  on/* 

"Do  you  think  your  money  or  hers  either  paid  for  a 
cent  of  this?"  she  says. 

"Ask  your  grandmother/'  I  says.  "Ask  her  what  became 
of  those  checks.  You  saw  her  bum  one  of  them,  as  I  re- 
member." She  wasn't  even  listening,  with  her  face  all 
gummed  up  with  paint  and  her  eyes  hard  as  a  fice  dog's. 

"Do  you  know  what  I'd  do  if  I  thought  your  money 
or  hers  either  bought  one  cent  of  this?'*  she  says,  putting 
her  hand  on  her  dress. 


£06        THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FUEY 

"What  would  you  do?'  I  says,  'Wear  a  barrel?" 

*Td  tear  it  right  off  and  throw  it  into  the  street, **  she 
says.  "Dont  you  believe  me?" 

"Sure  you  would/*  I  says.  "You  do  It  every  time/' 

"See  if  I  wouldn't/*  She  says.  She  grabbed  the  neck  of 
her  dress  In  both  hands  and  made  like  she  would  tear  it 

"You  tear  that  dress/*  1  says,  "And  I'll  give  you  a  whip- 
ping right  here  that  you'll  remember  all  your  life/* 

"See  if  I  dont/'  she  says.  Then  I  saw  that  she  really 
was  trying  to  tear  it,  to  tear  it  right  off  of  her.  By  the 
time  I  got  the  car  stopped  and  grabbed  her  hands  there 
Was  about  a  dozen  people  looking.  It  made  me  so  mad 
for  a  minute  It  kind  of  blinded  me. 

**You  do  a  thing  like  that  again  and  I'll  make  you  sorry 
you  ever  drew  breath/*  I  says. 

"I'm  sorry  now/*  she  says.  She  quit,  then  her  eyes 
turned  kind  of  funny  and  I  says  to  myself  if  you  cry  here 
in  this  car,  on  the  street,  I'll  whip  you.  I'll  wear  you  out 
Lucky  for  her  she  didn't,  so  I  turned  her  wrists  loose  and 
drove  on.  Luckily  we  were  near  an  alley,  where  I  could 
turn  into  the  back  street  and  dodge  the  square.  They 
were  already  putting  the  tent  up  In  Beard's  lot.  Earl  had 
already  given  me  the  two  passes  for  our  show  windows. 
She  sat  there  with  her  face  turned  away,  chewing  her 
lip.  *Tm  sorry  now/*  she  says.  "I  dont  see  why  I  was  ever 
born." 

"And  I  know  of  at  least  one  other  person  that  dont  un- 
derstand all  he  knows  about  that/'  I  says.  I  stopped  in 
front  of  the  school  house.  The  bell  had  rung,  and  the  last 
of  them  were  just  going  in.  "You're  on  time  for  once,  any- 
way," I  says.  "Are  you  going  in  there  and  stay  there,  or 
am  I  coming  with  you  and  make  you?"  She  got  out  and 
banged  the  door.  "Remember  what  I  say/*  I  says?  "I  mean 
it  Let  me  hear  one  more  time  that  you  are  slipping  up 


THE     SOTJXD     AND     THE     FURY 

and  down  back  alleys  with,  one  of  those  damn  squirts."" 

She  turned  back  at  that.  "I  dont  slip  around,"  she  says, 
"I  dare  anybody  to  know  everything  I  do.'* 

"And  they  all  know  it,  too/'  I  says.  "Everybody  in  this 
town  knows  what  you  are.  But  I  wont  have  it  anymore, 
you  hear?  I  dont  care  what  you  do,  myself/'  I  says,  "But 
I've  got  a  position  in  this  town,  and  I'm  not  going  to 
have  any  member  of  my  family  going  on  like  a  nigger 
wench.  You  hear  me?" 

"I  dont  care,"  she  says,  "I'm  bad  and  I'm  going  to  hell, 
and  I  dont  care.  I'd  rather  be  in  hell  than  anywhere 
where  you  are." 

"If  I  hear  one  more  time  that  you  haven't  been  to 
school,  you'll  wish  you  were  in  hell,"  I  says.  She  turned 
and  ran  on  across  the  yard.  "One  more  time,  remember/' 
I  says.  She  didn't  look  back. 

I  went  to  the  postoffice  and  got  the  mail  and  drove  on 
to  the  store  and  parked.  Earl  looked  at  me  when  I  came 
in.  I  gave  him  a  chance  to  say  something  about  my  being 
late,  but  he  just  said, 

"Those  cultivators  have  come.  You'd  better  help  Uncle 
Job  put  them  up." 

I  went  on  to  the  back,  where  old  Job  was  uncrating 
them,  at  the  rate  of  about  three  bolts  to  the  hour. 

"You  ought  to  be  working  for  me/?  I  says.  "Every  othei 
no -count  nigger  in  town  eats  in  my  kitchen. w 

"I  works  to  suit  de  man  whut  pays  me  Sat'dy  night/' 
he  says.  "When  I  does  dat,  it  dont  leave  me  a  whole  lot 
of  time  to  please  other  folks."  He  screwed  up  a  nut.  "Aint 
nobody  works  much  in  dis  country  cep  de  boll-weevil, 
noways,"  he  says. 

**You'd  better  be  glad  you're  not  a  boll- weevil  waiting 
on  those  cultivators,"  I  says.  "You'd  work  yourself  to 
death  before  they'd  be  ready  to  prevent  you." 


THE     SOUXB     AND     THE     FURY 

TDat's  de  troof,"  he  says,  "Boll-weevil  got  tough  time. 
Work  ev'y  day  in  de  week  out  in  de  hot  sun,  rain  er 
shine.  Aint  got  no  front  porch  to  set  on  en  watch  de  wat- 
termilyuns  growin  and  Safdy  dont  mean  nothin  a-tall  to 
him." 

"Saturday  wouldn't  mean  nothing  to  you,  either," 
I  says,  "if  it  depended  on  me  to  pay  you  wages.  Get  those 
things  out  of  the  crates  now  and  drag  them  inside." 

1  opened  her  letter  first  and  took  the  check  out.  Just 
like  a  woman.  Six  days  late.  Yet  they  try  to  make  men  be- 
lieve that  they're  capable  of  conducting  a  business, 
How  long  would  a  man  that  thought  the  first  of  the 
month  came  on  the  sixth  last  in  business.  And  like  as 
not,  when  they  sent  the  bank  statement  out,  she  would 
want  to  know  why  I  never  deposited  my  salary  until  the 
sixth.  Things  like  that  never  occur  to  a  woman. 

"I  had  no  answer  to  my  letter  about  Quentin's  easter 
dress.  Did  it  arrive  all  right?  IVe  had  no  answer  to  the 
last  two  letters  I  wrote  her,  though  the  check  in  the 
second  one  was  cashed  with  the  other  check.  Is  she 
sick?  Let  me  know  at  once  or  I'll  come  there  and  see 
for  myself.  You  promised  you  would  let  me  know 
when  she  needed  things.  I  will  expect  to  hear  from  you 
before  the  10th.  No  you'd  better  wire  me  at  once.  You 
are  opening  my  letters  to  her.  I  know  that  as  well  as  if 
I  were  looking  at  you.  You'd  better  wire  me  at  once 
about  her  to  this  address." 

About  that  time  Earl  started  yelling  at  Job,  so  I  put 
them  away  and  went  over  to  try  to  put  some  Hfe  into 
him.  What  this  country  needs  is  white  labour.  Let  these 
damn  trifling  niggers  starve  for  a  couple  of  years,  then 
they'd  see  what  a  soft  thing  they  have. 


A1STB     TBtE 

Along  toward  ten  oclock  I  went  up  front  There  was  a 
drummer  there.  It  was  a  couple  of  minutes  to  ten,  and  I 
invited  him  up  the  street  to  get  a  coca-cola.  We  got  to 
talking  about  crops. 

"There's  nothing  to  it,"  I  says,  "Cotton  is  a  speculator's 
crop.  They  fill  the  fanner  full  of  hot  air  and  get  him  to 
raise  a  big  crop  for  them  to  whipsaw  on  the  market,  to 
trim  the  suckers  with.  Do  you  think  the  farmer  gets  any- 
thing out  of  it  except  a  red  neck  and  a  hump  in  his  back? 
You  think  the  man  that  sweats  to  put  it  into  the  ground 
gets  a  red  cent  more  than  a  bare  living,"  I  says.  "Let  him 
make  a  big  crop  and  it  wont  be  worth  picking;  let  him 
make  a  small  crop  and  he  wont  have  enough  to  gin.  And 
what  for?  so  a  bunch  of  damn  eastern  jews,  I'm  not  talk- 
ing about  men  of  the  Jewish  religion,"  I  says,  "Tva 
known  some  jews  that  were  fine  citizens.  You  might  be 
one  yourself/'  I  says. 

"No,"  he  says,  "I'm  an  American." 

"No  offense,"  I  says.  "I  give  every  man  his  due,  regard- 
less of  religion  or  anything  else.  I  have  nothing  against 
jews  as  an  individual,"  I  says.  "It's  just  the  race.  You'll  ad-* 
mit  that  they  produce  nothing.  They  follow  the  pioneer? 
into  a  new  country  and  sell  them  clothes." 

"You're  thinking  of  Armenians/'  he  says,  "aren't  you.  A 
pioneer  wouldn't  have  any  use  for  new  clothes.'* 

"No  offense,"  I  says.  "I  dont  hold  a  man's  religion 
against  him." 

"Sure,"  he  says,  "I'm  an  American.  My  folks  have  some 
French  blood,  why  I  have  a  nose  like  this.  I'm  an  Amer- 
ican, all  right." 

"So  am  I,"  I  says.  "Not  many  of  us  left.  What  I'm  talk- 
ing about  is  the  fellows  that  sit  up  there  in  New  York 
and  trim  the  sucker  gamblers." 


210         THE      SOUND      A!N"D      THE      FURY 

'"That's  right,"  he  says.  "Nothing  to  gambling,  for  a 
poor  man.  There  ought  to  be  a  law  against  it." 

"Den-*,  you  think  I'm  right?"  I  says. 

<er  es/'  he  says,  "I  guess  you're  right.  The  farmer  catches 
it  coming  and  going/' 

"I  know  I'm  right/*  I  says.  "It's  a  sucker  game,  unless  a 
man  gets  inside  information  from  somebody  that  knows 
what's  going  on.  I  happen  to  be  associated  with  some 
people  who're  right  there  on  the  ground.  They  have  one 
of  the  biggest  manipulators  in  New  York  for  an  adviser. 
Way  I  do  it/'  I  says,  "I  never  risk  much  at  a  time.  It's  the 
fellow  that  thinks  he  knows  it  all  and  is  trying  to  make  a 
killing  with  three  dollars  that  they're  laying  for.  That's 
why  they  are  in  the  business." 

Then  it  struck  ten.  I  went  up  to  the  telegraph  office.  It 
opened  up  a  little,  just  like  they  said.  I  went  into  the 
comer  and  took  out  the  telegram  again,  just  to  be  sure. 
While  I  was  looking  at  it  a  report  came  in.  It  was  up  two 
points.  They  were  all  buying.  I  could  tell  that  from  what 
they  were  saying.  Getting  aboard.  Like  they  didn't  know 
it  could  go  but  one  way.  Like  there  was  a  law  or  some- 
thing against  doing  anything  but  buying.  Well,  I  reckon 
those  eastern  jews  have  got  to  live  too.  But  I'll  be 
damned  if  it  hasn't  come  to  a  pretty  pass  when  any  damn 
foreigner  that  cant  make  a  living  in  the  country  where 
God  put  him,  can  come  to  this  one  and  take  money 
right  out  of  an  American's  pockets.  It  was  up  two  points 
more.  Four  points.  But  hell,  they  were  right  there  and 
.knew  what  was  going  on.  And  5f  I  wasn't  going  to  take 
the  advice,  what  was  I  paying  them  ten  dollars  a  month 
for.  I  went  out,  then  I  remembered  and  came  back  and 
sent  the  wire.  "All  well.  Q  writing  today." 

"Q?"  the  operator  says. 

"Yes,"  I  says,  "Q.  Cant  you  spell  Q?" 


THB     SOUND     AND     THE     FURY 

6£I  just  asked  to  be  sure/'  he  says. 

"You  send  it  like  I  wrote  it  and  111  guarantee  you  to  be 
sure/*  I  says.  "Send  it  collect" 

**What  you  sending,  Jason?"  Doc  Wright  says,  looking 
over  my  shoulder.  "Is  that  a  code  message  to  buy?" 

"That's  all  right  about  that,"  I  says.  "You  boys  use 
your  own  judgment  You  know  more  about  it  than  those 
New  York  folks  do." 

'Well,  I  ought  to/'  Doc  says,  "I'd  a  saved  money  this 
year  raising  it  at  two  cents  a  pound." 

Another  report  came  in.  It  was  down  a  point. 

"Jason's  selling/'  Hopkins  says.  "Look  at  his  face/* 

"That's  all  right  about  what  I'm  doing/'  I  says.  *Yom 
boys  follow  your  own  judgment.  Those  rich  New  Yoric 
jews  have  got  to  live  like  everybody  eke/*  I  says. 

I  went  on  back  to  the  store.  Earl  was  busy  up  front 
I  went  on  back  to  the  desk  and  read  Lorraine's  letter, 
"Dear  daddy  wish  you  were  here*  No  good  parties  when 
daddys  out  of  town  I  miss  my  sweet  daddy."  I  reckon 
she  does.  Last  time  I  gave  her  forty  dollars.  Gave  it  to 
her.  I  never  promise  a  woman  anything  nor  let  her  know 
what  I'm  going  to  give  her.  That's  the  only  way  to  man- 
age them.  Always  keep  them  guessing.  If  you  cant  think 
of  any  other  way  to  surprise  them,  give  them  a  bust  in 
the  jaw. 

I  tore  it  up  and  burned  it  over  the  spittoon.  I  make 
it  a  rule  never  to  keep  a  scrap  of  paper  bearing  a 
woman's  hand,  and  I  never  write  them  at  aU.  Lorraine  is 
always  after  me  to  write  to  her  but  I  says  anything  I  for- 
got to  tell  you  will  save  till  I  get  to  Memphis  again  but 
I  says  I  dont  mind  you  writing  me  now  and  then  in  a 
plain  envelope,  but  if  you  ever  try  to  call  me  up  on  the 
telephone,  Memphis  wont  hold  you  I  says.  I  says  when 
Fm  up  there  I'm  one  of  the  boys,  but  I  m  not  going  to 


THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FURY 

ha/e  any  woman  calling  me  on  the  telephone.  Here  I 
says,  giving  her  the  forty  dollars.  If  you  ever  get  drunk 
and  take  a  notion  to  call  me  on  the  phone,  just  remember 
this  and  count  ten  before  you  do  it. 

"When  1  that  be?"  she  says. 

"What?"  I  says. 

"When  you're  coming  back,"  Llie  says. 

Til  let  you  know/'  I  says.  Then  she  tried  to  buy  a  beer, 
but  I  wouldn't  let  her.  "Keep  your  mo-iey,'"  I  says.  "Buy 
yourself  a  dress  with  it."  I  gave  the  m  id  a  five,  too.  After 
all,  like  I  say  money  has  no  value;  it's  just  the  way  you 
spend  it.  It  dont  belong  to  anybody,  so  why  tiy  to  hoard 
it  It  just  belongs  to  the  man  that  can  gv;  ic  and  keep  it 
There's  a  man  right  here  in  Jefferson  znc.cis  a  lot  of  money 
selling  rotten  goods  to  niggers,  lived  in  a  loom  over  the 
store  about  the  size  of  a  pigpen3  and  did  ids  own  cook- 
ing. About  four  or  five  years  sgo  he  was  taken  sick. 
Scared  the  hell  out  of  him  so  that  when  he  was  up  again 
he  joined  the  church  and  bought  himself  a  Chinese  mis- 
sionary, five  thousand  dollars  a  year.  1  often  think  how 
mad  hell  be  if  he  was  to  die  and  find  cut  there's  not  any 
heaven,  when  he  thinks  about  that  five  thousand  a  year. 
Like  I  say,  he'd  better  go  on  and  die  now  and  save 
money. 

When  it  was  burned  good  I  was  just  about  to  shove 
the  others  into  my  coat  when  all  of  a  sudden  something 
told  me  to  open  Quentin's  before  I  went  home,  but  about 
that  time  Earl  started  yelling  for  me  up  front,  so  I  put 
them  away  and  went  and  waited  on  the  damn  red- 
neck while  he  spent  fifteen  minutes  deciding  whether 
he  wanted  a  twenty  cent  hame  string  or  a  thirty-five  cent 
one. 

"You'd  better  take  that  good  one,"  I  says.  "How  do  you 


THE     SOTJXD     AND     THE     FURY 

fellows  ever  expect  to  get  ahead,  trying  to  work  with 
cheap  equipment?" 

"If  this  one  aint  any  good,"  he  says,  ^why  have  you 
got  it  on  sale?" 

"I  didn't  say  it  wasn't  any  good/7 1  says,  *1  said  it's  not 
as  good  as  that  other  one." 

"How  do  you  know  it's  not,"  he  says.  "You  ever  use  airy 
one  of  them?" 

"Because  they  dont  ask  thirty-five  cents  for  it,"  I  says. 
That's  ho\v  I  know  it's  not  as  good." 

He  held  the  twenty  cent  one  in  his  hands,  drawing  if 
through  his  fingers.  "I  reckon  111  take  this  hyer  one/'  he 
says.  I  offered  to  take  it  and  wrap  it,  but  he  rolled  it  up 
and  put  it  in  his  overalls.  Then  he  took  out  a  tobacco 
sack  and  finally  got  it  untied  and  shook  some  coins  out 
He  handed  me  a  quarter.  "That  fifteen  cents  wiU  buy  me 
a  snack  of  dinner/'  he  says. 

"All  right,"  I  says,  "You're  the  doctor.  But  dont  come 
complaining  to  me  next  year  when  you  have  to  buy  a 
new  outfit." 

"I  aint  makin  next  year's  crop  yit,"  he  says.  Finally  I 
got  rid  of  him,  but  every  time  I  took  that  letter  out  some- 
tiling  would  come  up.  They  were  all  in  town  for  the 
show,  coming  in  in  droves  to  give  their  money  to  some- 
thing that  brought  nothing  to  the  town  and  wouldn't 
leave  anything  except  what  those  grafters  in  the  Mayor's 
office  will  split  among  themselves,  and  Earl  chasing  back 
and  forth  like  a  hen  in  a  coop,  saying  "Yes,  ma'am,  Mr 
Compson  will  wait  on  you.  Jason,  show  this  lady  a 
chum  or  a  nickel's  worth  of  screen  hooks/' 

Well,  Jason  likes  work.  I  says  no  I  never  had  university 
advantages  because  at  Harvard  they  teach  you  how  to 
go  for  a  swim  at  night  without  knowing  how  to  swim 


THE     SOUXD      AND      THE      FURY 

and  at  Sewanee  they  dont  even  teach  you  what  water  is. 
I  says  you  might  send  me  to  the  state  University;  maybe 
1*11  learn  how  to  stop  my  clock  with  a  nose  spray  and 
then  you  can  send  Ben  to  the  Navy  I  says  or  to  the 
cavalry  anyway,  they  use  geldings  in  the  cavalry.  Then 
when  she  sent  Quentin  home  for  me  to  feed  too  I  says  I 
guess  that's  right  too,  instead  of  me  having  to  go  way  up 
north  for  a  job  they  sent  the  job  down  here  to  me  and 
then  Mother  begun  to  cry  and  I  says  it's  not  that  I  have 
any  objection  to  having  it  here;  if  it's  any  satisfaction  to 
you  I'll  quit  work  and  nurse  it  myself  and  let  you  and 
Dilsey  keep  the  flour  barrel  full,  or  Ben.  Rent  him  out  to 
a  sideshow;  there  must  be  folks  somewhere  that  would 
pay  a  dime  to  see  him,  then  she  cried  more  and  kept  say- 
ing my  poor  afflicted  baby  and  I  says  yes  hell  be  quite 
a  help  to  you  when  he  gets  his  growth  not  being  more 
than  one  and  a  half  times  as  high  as  me  now  and  she  says 
she'd  be  dead  soon  and  then  we'd  all  be  better  off  and  so 
I  says  all  right,  all  right,  have  it  your  way.  It's  your 
grandchild,  which  is  more  than  any  other  grandparents 
.it's  got  can  say  for  certain.  Only  I  says  it's  only  a  question 
of  time.  If  you  believe  shell  do  what  she  says  and  not  try 
to  see  it,  you  fool  yourself  because  the  first  time  that  was 
that  Mother  kept  on  saying  thank  God  you  are  not  a 
Coznpson  except  in  name,  because  you  are  all  I  have  left 
now,  you  and  Maury,  and  I  says  well  I  could  spare  Uncle 
Maury  myself  and  then  they  came  and  said  they  were 
ready  to  start  Mother  stopped  crying  then.  She  pulled 
her  veil  down  and  we  went  down  stairs.  Uncle  Maury 
was  coming  out  of  the  diningroom,  his  handkerchief  to 
his  mouth.  They  kind  of  made  a  lane  and  we  went  out 
the  door  just  in  time  to  see  Dilsey  driving  Ben  and  T.  P. 
back  around  the  corner.  We  went  down  the  steps  and  got 
in.  Uncle  Maury  kept  saying  Poor  little  sister,  poor  little 


TECB     SOUXD     AATB     TEE     FU&Y        21 J 

sister,  talking  around  his  mouth  and  patting  Mother's 
hand.  Talking  around  whatever  it  was. 

"Have  you  got  your  band  on?"  she  says.  **Why  dont 
they  go  on,  before  Benjamin  comes  out  and  makes  a 
spectacle.  Poor  little  boy.  He  doesn't  know.  He  cant  even 
realise/* 

'There,  there/*  TJnele  Maury  says,  patting  her  hand, 
talking  around  his  mouth.  "It's  better  so.  Let  him  be  un- 
aware o£  bereavement  until  he  has  to/7 

"Other  women  have  their  children  to  support  them  in 
times  like  this,**  Mother  says. 

**You  have  Jason  and  me,"  he  says. 

"It's  so  terrible  to  me/'  she  says,  "Having  the  two  of 
them  like  this,  in  less  than  two  years." 

'There,  there,"  he  says.  After  a  while  he  kind  of 
sneaked  his  hand  to  his  mouth  and  dropped  them  out 
the  window.  Then  I  knew  what  I  had  b©en  smelling. 
Clove  stems.  I  reckon  he  thought  that  the  Imst  he  could 
do  at  Father's  funeral  or  maybe  the  sideboard  thought  it 
was  still  Father  and  tripped  him  up  when  he  passed 
Like  I  say,  if  he  had  to  sell  something  to  send  Quentin  to 
Harvard  we'd  all  been  a  damn  sight  better  off  if  he'd 
sold  that  sideboard  and  bought  himself  a  one-armed 
strait  jacket  with  part  of  the  money.  I  reckon  the  reason 
all  the  Compson  gave  out  before  it  got  to  me  like  Mother 
says,  is  that  he  drank  it  up.  At  least  I  never  heard  of 
him  offering  to  sell  anything  to  send  me  to  Harvard. 

So  he  kept  on  patting  her  hand  and  saying  TPoor  little 
sister,"  patting  her  hand  with  one  of  the  black  gloves  that 
we  got  the  bill  for  four  days  later  because  it  was  the 
twenty-sixth  because  it  was  tie  same  day  one  month  that 
Father  went  up  there  and  got  it  and  brought  it  home 
and  wouldn't  tell  anything  about  where  she  was  or  any- 
thing and  Mother  crying  and  saying  "And  you  didn't 


it6        THE     SOUND     AKB     THE     FUBY 

even  see  him?  You  didn't  even  try  to  get  him  to  make  any 
provision  for  it?"  and  Father  says  "No  she  shall  not  touch 
Ms  money  not  one  cent  of  it"  and  Mother  says  "He  can 
be  forced  to  by  law.  He  can  prove  nothing,  unless — Ja- 
son Compson,"  she  says,  "Were  you  fool  enough  to  tell — * 

"Hush,  Caroline/'  Father  says,  then  he  sent  me  to  help 
Dilsey  get  that  old  cradle  out  of  the  attic  and  I  says, 

"Well,  they  brought  my  job  home  tonight"  because  all 
the  time  we  kept  hoping  they'd  get  things  straightened 
out  and  he'd  keep  her  because  Mother  kept  saying  she 
would  at  least  have  enough  regard  for  the  family  not  to 
jeopardize  my  chance  after  she  and  Quentin  had  had 
theirs. 

"And  whar  else  do  she  belong?"  Dilsey  says,  "Who 
else  gwine  raise  her  'cep  me?  Aint  I  raised  eve'y  one  of 
y'all?" 

"And  a  damn  fine  job  you  made  of  it,"  I  says.  "Anyway 
itll  give  her  something  to  sure  enough  worry  over  now.~ 
So  we  carried  the  cradle  down  and  Dilsey  started  to  set 
it  up  in  her  old  room.  Then  Mother  started  sure  enough. 

"Hush,  Miss  Cahline,"  Dilsey  says,  "You  gwine  wake 
her  up." 

"In  there?"  Mother  says,  "To  be  contaminated  by  that 
atmosphere?  It'll  be  hard  enough  as  it  is,  with  the  herit- 
age she  already  has." 

"Hush,"  Father  says,  "Dont  be  silly." 

"Why  aint  she  gwine  sleep  in  here,"  Dilsey  says,  "In 
the  same  room  whar  I  put  her  ma  to  bed  ev'y  night  of 
her  life  since  she  was  big  enough  to  sleep  by  herself.5" 

"You  dont  know,"  Mother  says,  "To  have  my  own 
daughter  cast  off  by  her  husband.  Poor  little  innocent 
baby,"  she  says,  looking  at  Quentin.  "You  will  never 
know  the  suffering  you've  caused." 

"Hush.  Caroline,"  Father  says. 


THE     SOUXD     ANB     THE     FTJBY 

"What  you  want  to  go  on  like  that  fo  Jason  fer?" 
sey  says. 

"I've  tried  to  protect  him,**  Mother  says.  *Tve  always 
tried  to  protect  him  from  it  At  least  I  can  do  my  best  to 
shield  her." 

"How  sleepin  in  dis  room  gwine  hurt  her,  I  like  to 
know,"  Dilsey  says. 

*1  cant  help  it/'  Mother  says.  "I  know  I'm  just  a  trou- 
blesome old  woman.  But  I  know  that  people  cannot  flout 
God's  laws  with  impunity." 

"Nonsense,"  Father  said.  "Fix  it  in  Miss  Caroline's 
room  then,  Dilsey ." 

"You  can  say  nonsense/'  Mother  says.  "But  she  must 
never  know.  She  must  never  even  learn  that  name.  Dil- 
sey, I  forbid  you  ever  to  speak  that  name  in  her  hearing. 
If  she  could  grow  up  never  to  know  that  she  had  a 
mother,  I  would  thank  God." 

"Done  be  a  fool/'  Father  says. 

"I  have  never  interfered  with  the  way  you  brought 
them  up/'  Mother  says,  "But  now  I  cannot  stand  any- 
more. We  must  decide  this  now,  tonight.  Either  that 
name  is  never  to  be  spoken  in  her  hearing,  or  she  must 
go,  or  I  will  go.  Take  your  choice." 

"Hush/'  Father  says,  "You're  just  upset  Fix  it  in  here, 
Dilsey." 

"En  you's  about  sick  too,"  Dilsey  says.  "You  looks  like 
a  hant.  You  git  in  bed  and  I'll  fix  you  a  toddy  and  see 
kin  you  sleep.  I  bet  you  aint  had  a  full  night's  sleep  since 
you  lef." 

"No/*  Mother  says,  "Dont  you  know  what  the  doctor 
says?  Why  must  you  encourage  him  to  drink?  That's 
what's  the  matter  with  him  now.  Look  at  rne,  I  suffer 
too,  but  I'm  not  so  weak  that  I  must  kill  myself  with 
whiskey." 


<*lS         THE     SOUND      AND     THE     FURY 

"Fiddlesticks/"  Father  says,  'What  do  doctors  know? 
They  make  their  livings  advising  people  to  do  whatever 
they  are  not  doing  at  the  time,  which  is  the  extent  of  any- 
one's knowledge  of  the  degenerate  ape.  You'll  have  a  min- 
ister in  to  hold  my  hand  next."  Then  Mother  cried,  and 
he  went  out.  Went  down  stairs,  and  then  I  heard  the 
sideboard.  I  woke  up  and  heard  him  going  down  again. 
Mother  had  gone  to  sleep  or  something,  because  the 
house  was  quiet  at  last.  He  was  trying  to  be  quiet  too,  be- 
cause I  couldn't  hear  him,  only  the  bottom  of  his  night- 
shirt and  his  bare  legs  in  front  of  the  sideboard. 

Dilsey  fixed  the  cradle  and  undressed  her  and  put  her 
in  it  She  never  had  waked  up  since  he  brought  her  in 
the  house. 

"She  pretty  near  too  big  f  er  hit,"  Dilsey  says.  "Dar  now. 
I  gwine  spread  me  a  pallet  right  acrost  de  hall,  so  you 
wont  need  to  git  up  in  de  night." 

*1  wont  sleep/7  Mother  says.  ""You  go  on  home.  I  wont 
mind.  Til  be  happy  to  give  the  rest  of  my  lif e  to  her,  if  I 
can  just  prevent — " 

"Hush,  now,"  Dilsey  says.  "We  gwine  take  keer  of  her. 
jfin  you  go  on  to  bed  too,"  she  says  to  me,  "You  got  to  go 
to  school  tomorrow." 

So  I  went  out,  then  Mother  called  me  back  and  cried 
on  me  awhile. 

"You  are  my  only  hope,"  she  says.  "Every  night  I  thank 
God  for  you."  While  we  were  waiting  there  for  them 
to  start  she  says  Thank  God  if  he  had  to  be  taken  too,  it 
is  you  left  me  and  not  Quentin.  Thank  God  you  are  not 
a  Compson,  because  all  I  have  left  now  is  you  and  Maury 
and  I  says,  Well  I  could  spare  Uncle  Maury  myself.  Well, 
he  kept  on  patting  her  hand  with  his  black  glove,  talking 
away  from  her.  He  took  them  off  when  his  turn  with  the 
shovel  came.  He  got  up  near  the  first,  where  they  were 


THE     SOtJHB     AND     THE     FURY 

holding  the  umbrellas  over  them,  stamping  every  now 
and  then  and  trying  to  kick  the  mud  off  their  feet  and 
sticking  to  the  shovels  so  they'd  have  to  knock  it  off, 
making  a  hollow  sound  when  it  fell  on  it,  and  when  I 
stepped  back  around  the  hack  I  could  see  him  behind  a 
tombstone,  taking  another  one  out  of  a  bottle.  I  thought 
he  never  was  going  to  stop  because  I  had  on  my  new  suit 
too,  but  it  happened  that  there  wasn't  much  mud  on  the 
wheels  yet,  only  Mother  saw  it  and  says  I  dont  know 
when  you'll  ever  have  another  one  and  Uncle  Maury 
says,  "Now,  now.  Dont  you  worry  at  all.  You  have  me  to 
depend  on,  always/* 

And  we  have.  Always.  The  fourth  letter  was  from  him 
But  there  wasn't  any  need  to  open  it.  I  could  have  writ- 
ten it  myself,  or  recited  it  to  her  from  memory,  adding 
ten  dollars  just  to  be  safe.  But  I  had  a  hunch  about  that 
other  letter.  I  just  felt  that  it  was  about  time  she  was  up 
to  some  of  her  tricks  again.  She  got  pretty  wise  after  that 
first  time.  She  found  out  pretty  quick  that  I  was  a  differ- 
ent breed  of  cat  from  Father.  When  they  begun  to  get  it 
filled  up  toward  the  top  Mother  started  crying  sure 
enough,  so  Uncle  Maury  got  in  with  her  and  drove  off. 
He  says  You  can  come  in  with  somebody;  they'll  be  glad 
to  give  you  a  lift.  I'll  have  to  take  your  mother  on  and 
I  thought  about  saying,  Yes  you  ought  to  brought  two 
bottles  instead  of  just  one  only  I  thought  about  where 
we  were,  so  I  let  them  go  on.  Little  they  cared  how  wet 
I  got,  because  then  Mother  could  have  a  whale  of  a  time 
being  afraid  I  was  taking  pneumonia. 

Well,  I  got  to  thinking  about  that  and  watching  them 
throwing  dirt  into  it,  slapping  it  on  anyway  like  they 
were  making  mortar  or  something  or  building  a  fence*, 
and  1  began  to  feel  sort  of  funny  and  so  I  decided  to 
walk  around  a  while.  I  thought  that  if  I  went  toward 


220        TUB     SOUKB      AND     THE     E'TJRY 

town  they'd  catch  up  and  be  trying  to  mafce  me  get  in 
one  of  them,  so  I  went  on  back  toward  the  nigger  grave- 
yard. I  got  under  some  cedars,  where  the  rain  didn't 
come  much,  only  dripping  now  and  then,  where  I  could 
see  when  they  got  through  and  went  away.  After  a  while 
they  were  all  gone  and  I  waited  a  minute  and  came  out. 

I  had  to  follow  the  path  to  keep  out  of  the  wet  grass  so 
I  didn't  see  her  until  I  was  pretty  near  there,  standing 
there  in  a  black  cloak,  looking  at  the  flowers.  I  knew  who 
it  was  right  off,  before  she  turned  and  looked  at  me  and 
lifted  up  her  veil. 

"Hello,  Jason/'  she  says,  holding  out  her  hand.  We 
shook  hands. 

'What  are  you  doing  here?"  I  says.  "I  thought  you 
promised  her  you  wouldn't  come  back  here.  I  thought 
you  had  more  sense  than  that." 

"Yes?"  she  says.  She  looked  at  the  flowers  again.  There 
must  have  been  fifty  dollars*  worth.  Somebody  had  put 
one  bunch  on  Quentin's.  'Ton  did?"  she  says. 

*Tm  not  surprised  though,"  I  says.  "I  wouldn't  put  any- 
thing past  you.  You  dont  mind  anybody.  You  dont  give 
a  damn  about  anybody." 

"Oh,"  she  says,  "that  job."  She  looked  at  the  grave.  *Tm 
sorry  about  that,  Jason." 

"I  bet  you  are,"  I  says.  "You'll  talk  mighty  meek  now. 
But  you  needn't  have  come  back.  There's  not  anything 
left.  Ask  Uncle  Maury,  if  you  dont  believe  me." 

"I  dont  want  anything,"  she  says.  She  looked  at  the 
grave,  "Why  didn't  they  let  me  know?"  she  says.  "I  just 
happened  to  see  it  in  the  paper.  On  the  back  page.  Just 
happened  to." 

I  didn't  say  anything.  We  stood  there,  looking  at  the 
grave,  and  then  I  got  to  thinking  about  when  we  were 
Bttle  and  one  thing  and  another  and  I  got  to  feeling 


THE     SOUKB     AKD     THE     FtTBY        221 

funny  again,  kind  of  mad  or  something,  dunking  about 
now  we'd  have  Uncle  Maury  around  the  house  all  the 
time,  running  things  like  the  way  he  left  me  to  come 
home  in  the  rain  by  myself.  I  says, 

"A  fine  lot  you  care,  sneaking  in  here  soon  as  he's  dead, 
But  it  wont  do  you  any  good.  Dont  think  that  you  can 
take  advantage  of  this  to  come  sneaking  back  If  you 
cant  stay  on  the  horse  you've  got,  youll  have  to  walk/'  I 
says,  "We  dont  even  know  your  name  at  that  house,"  I 
says.  "Do  you  know  that?  We  don't  even  know  you  with 
him  and  Quentin,"  I  says.  "Do  you  know  that?" 

"I  know  it/'  she  says,  "Jason,"  s^-e  says,  looking  at  the 
grave,  "if  you'll  fix  it  so  I  can  see  her  a  minute  I'll  give 
you  fifty  dollars." 

"You  haven't  got  fifty  dollars,"  I  says. 

<cWill  you?"  she  says,  not  looking  at  me. 

'"Let's  see  it,"  I  says.  "I  dont  believe  you've  got  fifty 
dollars" 

I  could  see  where  her  hands  were  moving  under  hec 
cloak,  then  she  held  her  hand  out.  Damn  if  it  wasn't  full 
of  money.  I  could  see  two  or  three  yellow  ones. 

"Does  he  still  give  you  money?"  I  says.  "How  much 
does  he  send  you?" 

"Ill  give  you  a  hundred,"  she  says.  "Will  you?" 

"Just  a  minute,"  I  says,  "And  just  like  I  say.  I  wouldn't 
have  her  know  it  for  a  thousand  dollars." 

"Yes,"  she  says.  "Just  like  you  say  do  it.  Just  so  I  see  her 
a  minute.  I  wont  beg  or  do  anything.  I'll  go  right  OB 
away." 

"Give-  me  the  money,"  I  says. 

"Ill  give  it  to  you  afterward,"  she  says. 

"Dont  you  trust  me??'  I  says. 

"No,"  she  says.  "I  know  you.  I  grew  up  with  you." 

a  fine  one  to  talk  about  trusting  people/7 1  says. 


222        THE     SOXJXD     A'ND     THE     PITHY 

"Well/*  1  says,  1  got  to  get  on  out  of  the  rain.  Goodbye.1® 
1  made  to  go  away. 

"Jason,"  she  says.   I  stopped. 

"Yes?"  I  says.  "Hurry  up.  I'm  getting  wet" 

"All  right/'  she  says.  "Here."  There  wasn't  anybody  in 
sight.  I  went  back  and  took  the  money.  She  still  held  to 
It  "You'll  do  it?"  she  says,  looking  at  me  from  under  the 
veil,  "You  promise?" 

"Let  go,"  I  says,  *Tou  want  somebody  to  come  along 
and  see  us?" 

She  let  go.  I  put  the  money  in  my  pocket.  <tfYoull  do  it, 
[ason?**  she  says.  "I  wouldn't  ask  you,  if  there  was  any 
other  way." 

"You're  damn  right  there's  no  other  way/'  I  says.  "Sure 
111  do  it.  I  said  I  would,  didn't  I?  Only  you'll  have  to  do 
just  like  I  say,  now." 

"Yes/*  she  says,  *1  will."  So  I  told  her  where  to  be,  and 
went  to  the  livery  stable.  I  hurried  and  got  there  just  as 
they  were  unhitching  the  hack.  I  asked  if  they  had  paid, 
for  it  yet  and  he  said  No  and  I  said  Mrs  Compson  forgot 
something  and  wanted  it  again,  so  they  let  me  take  it. 
Mink  was  driving.  I  bought  him  a  cigar,  so  we  drove 
around  until  it  begun  to  get  dark  on  the  back  streets 
where  they  wouldn't  see  him.  Then  Mink  said  he'd  have 
to  take  the  team  on  back  and  so  I  said  I'd  buy  him  an- 
other cigar  and  so  we  drove  into  the  lane  and  I  went 
across  the  yard  to  the  house.  I  stopped  in  the  hall  until  I 
could  hear  Mother  and  Uncle  Maury  upstairs,  then  I 
went  on  back  to  the  kitchen.  She  and  Ben  were  there  with 
Dilsey.  I  said  Mother  wanted  her  and  I  took  her  into  the 
house.  I  found  Uncle  Maury's  raincoat  and  put  it  around 
her  and  picked  her  up  and  went  back  to  the  lane  and  got 
\u  the  hack.  I  told  Mink  to  drive  to  the  depot.  He  was 
afraid  to  pass  the  stable,  so  we  had  to  go  the  back  way 


SOUKD     AND      THE     FUKY        223 

and  I  saw  her  standing  on  the  corner  under  the  light  and 
I  told  Mink  to  drive  close  to  the  walk  and  when  I  said 
Go  on,  to  give  the  team  a  bat.  Then  I  took  the  raincoat 
off  of  her  and  held  her  to  the  window  and  Caddy  saw 
her  and  sort  of  jumped  forward. 

"Hit  'em,  Mink!"  I  says,  and  Mink  gave  them  a  cut  and 
we  went  past  her  like  a  fire  engine.  "Now  get  on  that 
traiii  like  you  promised,"  I  says.  I  could  see  her  running 
after  us  through  the  back  window.  "Hit  'em  again,"  1 
says,  "Let's  get  on  home."  When  we  turned  the  comer 
she  was  still  running. 

And  so  I  counted  the  money  again  that  night  and  put 
it  away,  and  I  didn't  feel  so  bad.  I  says  I  reckon  that'll 
show  you.  I  reckon  you'll  know  now  that  you  cant  beat 
me  out  of  a  job  and  get  away  with  it  It  never  occurred 
to  me  she  wouldn't  keep  her  promise  and  take  that  train. 
But  I  didn't  know  much  about  them  then;  I  didn't  have 
any  more  sense  than  to  believe  what  they  said,  because 
the  next  morning  damn  if  she  didn't  walk  right  into  the 
store,  only  she  had  sense  enough  to  wear  the  veil  and  not 
speak  to  anybody.  It  was  Saturday  morning,  because  I 
was  at  the  store,  and  she  came  right  on  back  to  the  desk 
where  I  was,  walking  fast. 

"Liar,"  she  says,  "Liar." 

"Are  you  crazy?"  I  says.  "What  do  you  mean?  coming 
in  here  like  this?"  She  started  in,  but  I  shut  her  off.  I  says, 
"You  already  cost  me  one  job;  do  you  want  rne  to  lose 
this  one  too?  If  you've  got  anything  to  say  to  me,  I'll 
meet  you  somewhere  after  dark.  What  have  you  got  to 
say  to  me?"  I  says,  "Didn't  I  do  everything  I  said?  I  said 
see  her  a  minute,  didn't  I?  Well,  didn't  you?"  She  just 
stood  there  looking  at  me,  shaking  like  an  ague-fit,  her 
hands  clenched  and  kind  of  jerking.  "I  did  just  what  I 
said  I  would/'  I  says,  "You're  the  one  that  lied.  You  prom* 


224        THE     SOUXD     AND     THE 

ised  to  take  that  train.  Didn't  you  Didn't  you  promise? 
If  vou  think  yon  can  get  that  money  back,  just  try  it,"  I 
says.  "If  it'd  been  a  thousand  dollars,  you'd  still  owe  me 
after  the  risk  I  took.  And  if  I  see  or  hear  you're  still  in 
town  after  number  17  runs,"  I  says,  "111  tell  Mother  and 
Uncle  Maury.  Then  hold  your  breath  until  you  see  her 
again/'  She  just  stood  there,  looking  at  me,  twisting  her 
hands  together. 

"Damn  you,"  she  says,  "Damn  you/* 

"Sure/*  I  says,  "That's  all  right  too.  Mind  what  I  say, 
now.  After  number  17,  and  I  tell  them/' 

After  she  was  gone  I  felt  better.  I  says  I  reckon  you'll 
think  twice  before  you  deprive  me  of  a  job  that  was 
promised  me.  I  was  a  kid  then.  I  believed  folks  when 
they  said  they'd  do  things.  I've  learned  better  since.  Be- 
sides, like  I  say  I  guess  I  dont  need  any  man's  help  to  get 
alono"  I  can  stand  on  my  own  feet  like  I  always  have. 
Then  all  of  a  sudden  I  thought  of  Dilsey  and  Uncle 
Maury.  I  thought  how  she'd  get  around  Dilsey  and  that 
Uncle  Maury  would  do  anything  for  ten  dollars.  And 
there  I  was,  couldn't  even  get  away  from  the  store  to  pro- 
tect my  own  Mother.  Like  she  says,  if  one  of  you  had  to 
be  taken,  thank  God  it  was  you  left  me  I  can  depend  on 
you  and  I  says  well  I  dont  reckon  111  ever  get  far  enough 
from  the  store  to  get  out  of  your  reach.  Somebody's  got 
to  hold  on  to  what  little  we  have  left,  I  reckon. 

So  as  soon  as  I  got  home  I  fixed  Dilsey.  I  told  Dilsey 
she  had  leprosy  and  I  got  the  bible  and  read  where  a 
man's  flesh  rotted  off  and  I  told  her  that  if  she  ever 
looked  at  her  or  Ben  or  Quentin  they'd  catch  it  too.  So  I 
thought  I  had  everything  all  fixed  until  that  day  when  I 
carne  home  and  found  Ben  bellowing.  Raising  hell  and 
nobody  could  quiet  him.  Mother  said,  Well,  get  him  the 
slipper  then.  Dilsey  made  out  she  didn't  hear.  Mother 


THE     SOc-Nl)     AND     THE     FURY 

said  It  again  and  1  says  I'd  go  I  couldn't  stand  that  damn 
noise.  Like  I  say  I  can  stand  lots  of  things  I  dont  expect 
much  from  them  but  if  I  have  to  work  all  day  long  in  a 
damn  store  damn  if  I  dont  think  I  deserve  a  little  peace 
and  quiet  to  eat  dinner  in.  So  I  says  I'd  go  and  Dilsey 
says  quick,  "Jason*" 

Well,  like  a  flash  I  knew  what  was  up,  but  just  to 
make  sure  I  went  and  got  the  slipper  and  brought  it  back, 
and  just  like  I  thought,  when  he  saw  it  you'd  thought  we 
were  killing  him.  So  I  made  Dilsey  own  up,  then  I  told 
Mother.  We  had  to  take  her  up  to  bed  then,  and  after 
things  got  quieted  down  a  little  I  put  the  fear  of  God  into 
Dilsey.  As  much  as  you  can  into  a  nigger,  that  is.  That's 
the  trouble  with  nigger  servants,  when  they've  been  with 
you  for  a  long  time  they  get  so  full  of  self  importance 
that  they're  not  worth  a  damn.  Think  they  run  the  whole 
family. 

"I  like  to  know  whut's  de  hurt  in  lettin  dat  po  chile 
see  her  own  baby/'  Dilsey  says.  "If  Mr  Jason  was  still 
here  hit  ud  be  different." 

"Only  Mr  Jason's  not  here/'  I  says.  "I  know  you  wont 
pay  me  any  mind,  but  I  reckon  you'll  do  what  Mother 
says.  You  keep  on  worrying  her  like  this  until  you  get  her 
into  the  graveyard  too,  then  you  can  fill  the  whole  house 
full  of  ragtag  and  bobtail.  But  what  did  you  want  to  let 
that  damn  idiot  see  her  for?" 

"You's  a  cold  man,  Jason,  if  man  you  is,"  she  says.  "I 
thank  de  Lawd  I  got  mo  heart  dan  dat,  even  ef  hit  is 
black." 

"At  least  I'm  man  enough  to  keep  that  flour  barrel  full/* 
I  says.  "And  if  you  do  that  again,  you  wont  be  eating  out 
of  it  either/' 

So  the  next  time  I  told  her  that  if  she  tried  Dilsey 
again,  Mother  was  going  to  fire  Dilsey  and  send  Ben  to 


THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FUBY 

Jackson  and  take  Quentin  and  go  away.  She  looked  at 
me  for  a  while.  There  wasn't  any  street  light  close  and  1 
couldn't  see  her  face  much.  But  I  could  feel  her  looking 
at  me.  When  we  were  little  when  she'd  get  mad  and 
couldn't  do  anything  about  it  her  upper  lip  would  begin 
to  jump.  Everytime  it  jumped  it  would  leave  a  little  more 
of  her  teeth  showing,  and  all  the  time  she'd  be  as  still  as 
a  post,  not  a  muscle  moving  except  her  lip  jerking 
higher  and  higher  up  her  teeth.  But  she  didn't  say  any- 
thing. She  just  said, 

"All  right  How  much?" 

*WeIl,  if  one  look  through  a  hack  window  was  "worth 
a  hundred,"  I  says.  So  after  that  she  behaved  pretty  well, 
only  one  time  she  asked  to  see  a  statement  of  the  bank 
account. 

"I  know  they  have  Mother's  indorsement  on  them,"  she 
says,  "But  I  want  to  see  the  bank  statement.  I  want  to  see 
myself  where  those  checks  go." 

"That's  in  Mother's  private  business,"  I  says.  "If  you 
think  you  have  any  right  to  pry  into  her  private  affairs 
111  tell  her  you  believe  those  checks  are  being  misappro- 
priated and  you  want  an  audit  because  you  dont  trust 
her." 

She  didn't  say  anything  or  move.  I  could  hear  her 
whispering  Damn  you  oh  damn  you  oh  damn  you. 

"Say  it  out,"  I  says,  "I  dont  reckon  it's  any  secret  what 
you  and  I  think  of  one  another.  Maybe  you  want  the 
money  back,"  I  says. 

"Listen,  Jason/'  she  says,  "Dont  lie  to  me  now.  About 
her.  I  wont  ask  to  see  anything.  If  that  isn't  enough,  I'll 
send  more  each  month.  Just  promise  that  she'll — that 
she — You  can  do  that.  Things  for  her.  Be  kind  to  her. 
Little  things  that  I  cant,  they  wont  let.  .  .  .  But  you 
wont  You  never  had  a  drop  of  warm  blood  in  you.  Lis~ 


THE     SOUXD     AND     THE     FURY        227 

ten,"  she  says,  "If  you'll  get  Mother  to  let  me  have  her 
back,  I'll  give  you  a  thousand  dollars.** 

"You  haven't  got  a  thousand  dollars/'  I  says,  "I  know 
you're  lying  now." 

"Yes  I  have.  I  will  have.  I  can  get  it" 

"And  I  know  how  you'll  get  it/'  I  says,  "You'll  get  it 
the  same  way  you  got  her.  And  when  she  gets  big 
enough — '"'  Then  I  thought  she  really  was  going  to  hit  at 
me,  and  then  I  didn't  know  what  she  was  going  to  do. 
She  acted  for  a  minute  like  some  kind  of  a  toy  that's 
wound  up  too  tight  and  about  to  burst  all  to  pieces. 

"Oh,  I'm  crazy/'  she  says,  "I'm  insane.  I  can't  take  her. 
Keep  her.  What  am  I  thinking  of.  Jason/*  she  says,  grab- 
bing my  arm.  Her  hands  were  hot  as  fever.  "You'll  have 
to  promise  to  take  care  of  her,  to — She's  kin  to  you;  your 
own  flesh  and  blood.  Promise,  Jason.  You  have  Father's 
name:  do  you  think  I'd  have  to  ask  him  twice?  once, 
even?" 

"That's  so/*  I  says,  "He  did  leave  me  something.  What 
do  you  want  me  to  do,"  I  says,  "Buy  an  apron  and  a  go- 
cart?  I  never  got  you  into  this/'  I  says.  "I  run  more  risk 
than  you  do,  because  you  haven't  got  anything  at  stake. 
So  if  you  expect — ** 

"No/'  she  says,  then  she  begun  to  laugh  and  to  try  to 
hold  it  back  all  at  the  same  time.  "No.  I  have  nothing  at 
stake/'  she  says,  making  that  noise,  putting  her  hands  to 
her  mouth,  "Nuh-nuh-nothing/'  she  says. 

"Here,"  I  says,  "Stop  that!" 

"I'm  trying  to/'  she  says,  holding  her  hands  over  her 
mouth.  "Oh  God,  oh  God." 

"I'm  going  away  from  here/'  I  says,  "I  cant  be  seen 
here.  You  get  on  out  of  town  now,  you  hear?" 

"Wait/'  she  says,  catching  my  arm.  Tve  stopped.  I 
wont  again.  You  promise,  Jason?"  she  says,  and  me  feel- 


228        THE     SOXJND     AND     THE     FTJBT 

ing  her  eyes  almost  like  they  were  touching  my  face, 
"You  promise?  Mother — that  money — If  sometimes  she 
needs  things — If  I  send  checks  for  her  to  you,  other  ones 
besides  those,  you'll  give  them  to  her?  You  wont  tell? 
You'll  see  that  she  has  things  like  other  girls?" 

"Sure,"  I  says,  "As  long  as  you  behave  and  do  like  I  tell 
you/- 
And so  when  Earl  came  up  front  with  his  hat  on  he 
says,  *Tm  going  to  step  up  to  Rogers'  and  get  a  snack. 
We  wont  have  time  to  go  home  to  dinner,  I  reckon." 

"What's  the  matter  we  wont  have  time?"  I  says. 

"With  this  show  in  town  and  all/'  he  says.  "They're  go- 
ing to  give  an  afternoon  performance  too,  and  they'll  all 
want  to  get  done  trading  in  time  to  go  to  it.  So  we'd 
better  just  run  up  to  Rogers." 

^All  right,"  I  says,  "It's  your  stomach.  If  you  want  to 
make  a  slave  of  yourself  to  your  business,  It's  all  right 
with  me." 

"I  reckon  you'll  never  be  a  slave  to  any  business,"  he 
says. 

"Not  unless  it's  Jason  Compson's  business,"  I   says. 

So  when  I  went  bacK  and  opened  it  the  only  thing  that 
surprised  me  was  it  was  a  money  order  not  a  check.  Yes, 
sir.  You  cant  trust  a  one  of  them.  After  all  the  risk  I'd 
taken,  risking  Mother  finding  out  about  her  coming  down 
here  once  or  twice  a  year  sometimes,  and  me  having  to 
tell  Mother  lies  about  it.  That's  gratitude  for  you.  And  I 
wouldn't  put  it  past  her  to  try  to  notify  the  postoffice  not 
to  let  anyone  except  her  cash  it.  Giving  a  kid  like  that 
fifty  dollars.  Why  I  never  saw  fifty  dollars  until  I  was 
twenty-one  years  old,  with  all  the  other  boys  with  the 
afternoon  off  and  all  day  Saturday  and  me  working  in  a 
store.  Like  I  say,  how  can  they  expect  anybody  to  control 
her,  with  her  giving  her  money  behind  our  backs.  She 


TKE     SOUND     AND     THE     FITKY 

has  the  same  home  you  had  I  says,  and  the  same  raising. 
1  reckon  Mother  is  a  better  judge  of  what  she  needs  than 
you  are,  that  haven't  even  got  a  home.  *lf  you  want  to 
give  her  money/*  I  says,  "You  send  it  to  Mother,  dont  be 
giving  it  to  her.  If  Fve  got  to  run  this  risk  every  few 
months,  you'll  have  to  do  like  I  say,  or  it's  out." 

And  just  about  the  time  I  got  ready  to  begin  on  it  b^ 
cause  if  Earl  thought  I  was  going  to  dash  up  the  street 
and  gobble  two  bits  worth  of  indigestion  on  his  account 
he  was  bad  fooled.  I  may  not  be  sitting  with  my  feet  on  a 
mahogany  desk  but  I  am  being  paid  for  what  I  do  inside 
this  building  and  if  I  can  manage  to  live  a  civilised  life 
outside  of  it  I'll  go  where  I  can.  I  can  stand  on  my  own 
feet;  I  dont  need  any  man's  mahogany  desk  to  prop  me 
up.  So  just  about  the  time  I  got  ready  to  start  I'd  have 
to  drop  everything  and  run  to  sell  some  redneck  a  dime's 
worth  of  nails  or  something,  and  Earl  up  there  gobbling 
a  sandwich  and  half  way  back  already,  like  as  not,  arid 
then  I  found  that  all  the  blanks  were  gone.  I  remembered 
then  that  I  had  aimed  to  get  some  more,  but  it  was  too 
late  now,  and  then  I  looked  up  and  there  Quentin  came. 
In  the  back  door.  I  heard  her  asking  old  Job  if  I  was 
there.  I  just  had  time  to  stick  them  in  the  drawer  and! 
close  it. 

She  came  around  to  the  desk.  I  looked  at  my  watch. 

"You  been  to  dinner  already?"  I  says.  "It's  just  twelve; 
I  just  heard  it  strike.  You  must  have  flown  home  and 
back" 

*Tm  not  going  home  to  dinner/'  she  says.  "Did  I  get  a 
letter  today?" 

''Were  you  expecting  one?"  I  says.  "Have  you  got  a 
sweetie  that  can  write?" 

"From  Mother/*  she  says.  "Did  I  get  a  letter  from 
Mother?"  she  says,  looking  at  me. 


230        THE     SOUND     AISTB     THE     FURY 

"Mother  got  one  from  her/*  I  says.  "I  haven't  opened 
it.  You'll  have  to  wait  until  she  opens  it.  Shell  let  you  see 
it,  I  imagine/* 

"Please,  Jason/*  she  says,  not  paying  any  attention^ 
"Did  I  get  oner 

"What's  the  matter?"  I  says.  "I  never  knew  you  to  be 
this  anxious  about  anybody.  You  must  expect  some 
money  from  her/' 

"She  said  she — "  she  says.  "Please,  Jason/*  she  says, 

"Did  ir 

"You  must  have  been  to  school  today,  after  all/*  I  says, 
"Somewhere  where  they  taught  you  to  say  please.  Wait 
a  minute,  while  I  wait  on  that  customer/' 

I  went  and  waited  on  him.  When  I  turned  to  come 
back  she  was  out  of  sight  behind  the  desk.  I  ran.  I  ran 
around  the  desk  and  caught  her  as  she  jerked  her  hand 
out  of  the  drawer.  I  took  the  letter  away  from  her,  beat- 
ing her  knuckles  on  the  desk  until  she  let  go. 

"You  would,  would  you?"  I  says. 

"Give  it  to  me/'  she  says,  "You've  already  opened  it. 
Give  it  to  me.  Please,  Jason.  It's  mine.  I  saw  the  name.** 

Til  take  a  harne  string  to  you,"  I  says,  "That's  what  111 
give  you.  Going  into  my  papers." 

"Is  there  some  money  in  it?"  she  says,  reaching  for  it. 
"She  said  she  would  send  me  some  money.  She  promised 
she  would.  Give  it  to  me/' 

"What  do  you  want  with  money?"  I  says. 

"She  said  she  would/'  she  says,  "Give  it  to  me.  Please, 
Jason.  I  wont  ever  ask  you  anything  again,  if  you'll  give 
it  to  me  this  time." 

"I'm  going  to,  if  you'll  give  me  time/'  I  says.  I  took  the 
letter  and  the  money  order  out  and  gave  her  the  letter. 
She  reached  for  the  money  order,  not  hardly  glancing  at 
the  letter.  "You'll  have  to  sign  it  first,"  I  says. 


THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FUKY 

"How  much  is  it?"  she  says. 

'Head  the  letter/'  I  says.  "I  reckon  it'll  say." 

She  read  it  fast,  in  about  two  looks. 

"It  dont  say/*  she  says,  looking  up.  She  dropped  the 
letter  to  the  floor.  "How  much  is  it?" 

"It's  ten  dollars/*  I  says. 

'Ten  dollars?**  she  says,  staring  at  me. 

"And  you  ought  to  be  damn  glad  to  get  that,**  I  says, 
"A  kid  like  you.  What  are  you  in  such  a  rush  for  money- 
all  of  a  sudden  for?" 

"Ten  dollars?**  she  says,  like  she  was  talking  in  her 
sleep,  "Just  ten  dollars?"  She  made  a  grab  at  the  money 
order.  "You're  lying,"  she  says.  "Thief!"  she  says,  Thief r 

"You  would,  would  you?"  I  says,  holding  her  off. 

"Give  it  to  me!**  she  says,  "It's  mine.  She  sent  it  to  me.  I 
will  see  it.  I  will." 

"You  will?"  I  says,  holding  her,  "How're  you  going  to 
do  it?" 

"Just  let  me  see  it,  Jason/*  she  says,  "Please.  I  wont  ask 
you  for  anything  again.*' 

"Think  I'm  lying,  do  you?"  I  says.  "Just  for  that  you 
wont  see  it." 

"But  just  ten  dollars/'  she  says,  "She  told  me  she — she 
told  me — Jason,  please  please  please.  I've  got  to  have 
some  money.  IVe  just  got  to.  Give  it  to  me,  Jason.  I'D 
do  anything  if  you  will." 

"Tell  me  what  you've  got  to  have  money  for,"  I  says. 

"I've  got  to  have  it,"  she  says.  She  was  looking  at  me. 
Then  all  of  a  sudden  she  quit  looking  at  me  without 
moving  her  eyes  at  all.  I  knew  she  was  going  to  lie.  "It's 
some  money  I  owe/*  she  says.  "I've  got  to  pay  it.  I've  got 
to  pay  it  today/* 

"Who  to?"  I  says.  Her  hands  were  sort  of  twisting.  I 
could  watch  her  trying  to  think  of  a  lie  to  tell.  "Have  you 


THE     SOUND     A^D      THE      FURY 


been  charging  things  at  stores  again?'*  I  says.  "You 
needn't  bother  to  tell  me  that.  If  you  can  find  anybody 
in  this  town  that!!  charge  anything  to  you  after  what  I 
told  them,  111  eat  it" 

"It's  a  girl,"  she  says,  "It's  a  girl.  I  borrowed  some 
money  from  a  girl.  I've  got  to  pay  it  back.  Jason,  give  it 
to  me.  Please.  I'll  do  anything.  I've  got  to  have  it.  Mother 
will  pay  you.  Ill  write  to  her  to  pay  you  and  that  I  »vont 
ever  ask  her  for  anything  again.  You  can  see  the  letter. 
Please,  Jason.  IVe  got  to  have  it." 

'Tell  me  what  you  want  with  it,  and  111  see  about  it," 
I  says.  "Tell  me."  She  just  stood  there,  with  her  hands 
working  against  her  dress.  "All  right,"  I  says,  "If  ten  dol- 
lars is  too  little  for  you,  111  just  take  it  home  to  Mother, 
and  yon  know  whatll  happen  to  it  then.  Of  course,  if 
you're  so  rich  you  dont  need  ten  dollars  —  9> 

She  stood  there,  looking  at  the  floor,  kind  of  mumbling 
to  herself.  "She  said  she  would  send  me  some  money. 
She  said  she  sends  money  here  and  you  say  she  dont  send 
any.  She  said  she's  sent  a  lot  of  money  here.  She  says  it's 
for  rne.  That  it's  for  me  to  have  some  of  it.  And  you  say 
we  haven't  got  any  monej  ." 

"You  know  as  much  about  that  as  I  do,"  I  says.  "You've 
seen  what  happens  to  those  checks." 

"Yes,"  she  says,  looking  at  the  floor.  "Ten  dollars/'  she 
says,  "Ten  dollars." 

"And  you'd  better  thank  your  stars  it's  ten  dollars,"  I 
says.  "Here,"  I  says.  I  put  the  money  order  face  down  on 
the  desk,  holding  my  hand  on  it,  "Sign  it." 

'Will  you  let  me  see  it?"  she  says.  "I  just  want  to  look 
at  it.  Whatever  it  says,  I  wont  ask  for  but  ten  dollars.  You 
can  have  the  rest.  I  just  want  to  see  it" 

"Not  after  the  way  youVe  acted,"  I  says,  "You've  got  to 
learn  one  thing,  and  that  is  that  when  I  tell  you  to  do 


THE     SOUND     AISTB     THE     :FTJRY        233 

something,  you've  got  it  to  do.  You  sign  your  name  on 
that  line." 

She  took  the  pen,  but  instead  of  signing  it  she  just 
stood  there  with  her  head  bent  and  the  pen  shaking  In 
her  hand.  Just  like  her  mother.  "Oh,  God,"  she  says,  "oil, 
God." 

"Yes,"  I  says,  That's  one  thing  you'll  have  to  learn  if 
you  never  learn  anything  else.  Sign  it  now,  and  get  on 
out  of  here." 

She  signed  it.  "Where's  the  money?"  she  says.  I  took 
the  order  and  blotted  it  and  put  it  in  my  pocket  Then  I 
gave  her  the  ten  dollars. 

"Now  you  go  on  back  to  school  this  afternoon,  you 
hear?"  I  says.  She  didn't  answer.  She  crumpled  the  bill 
up  in  her  hand  like  it  was  a  rag  or  something  and  went 
on  out  the  front  door  just  as  Earl  came  in.  A  customer 
came  in  with  him  and  they  stopped  up  front.  I  gathered 
up  the  things  and  put  on  my  hat  and  went  up  front. 

"Been  much  busy?"  Earl  says. 

"Not  much,"  I  says.  He  looked  out  the  door, 

"That  your  car  over  yonder?"  he  says.  "Better  not  try  te 
go  out  home  to  dinner.  We'll  likely  have  another  rush 
just  before  the  show  opens.  Get  you  a  lunch  at  Rogers* 
and  put  a  ticket  in  the  drawer." 

"Much  obliged,"  I  says.  "I  can  still  manage  to  feed  my- 
self, I  reckon." 

And  right  there  he'd  stay,  watching  that  door  like  a 
hawk  until  I  came  through  it  again.  Well,  he'd  just  have 
to  watch  it  for  a  while;  I  was  doing  the  best  I  could.  The 
time  before  I  says  that's  the  last  one  now;  you'll  have  to 
remember  to  get  some  more  right  away.  But  who  can  re- 
member anything  in  all  this  hurrah.  And  now  this  damn 
show  had  to  come  here  the  one  day  Yd  have  to  hunt  all 
over  town  for  a  blank  check,  besides  all  the  other  tilings 


234         THE     ^OTXN"U     A1STB      THE 

I  had  to  do  to  keep  the  house  running,  and  EaxI 
watching  the  door  Like  a  hawk. 

I  went  to  the  printing  shop  and  told  him  I  wanted  to 
play  a  joke  on  a  fellow,  but  he  didn't  have  anything. 
Then  he  told  me  to  have  a  look  in  the  old  opera  house, 
where  somebody  had  stored  a  lot  of  papers  and  junk  out 
of  the  old  Merchants*  and  Farmers'  Bank  when  it  failed, 
so  I  dodged  up  a  few  more  alleys  so  Earl  couldn't  see  me 
and  finally  found  old  man  Simmons  and  got  the  key  from 
him  and  went  up  there  and  dug  around.  At  last  I  found 
a  pad  on  a  Saint  Louis  bank.  And  of  course  she'd  pick 
this  one  time  to  look  at  it  close.  Well,  it  would  have  to 
do.  I  couldn't  waste  any  more  time  now. 

I  went  back  to  the  store.  "Forgot  some  papers  Mother 
wants  to  go  to  the  bank,"  I  says.  I  went  back  to  the  desk 
and  fixed  the  check.  Trying  to  hurry  and  all.  I  says  to 
myself  it's  a  good  thing  her  eyes  are  giving  out,  with  that 
little  whore  in  the  house,  a  Christian  forbearing  woman 
like  Mother.  I  says  you  know  just  as  well  as  I  do  what 
she's  going  to  grow  up  into  but  I  says  that's  your  busi- 
ness, if  you  want  to  keep  her  and  raise  her  in  your  house 
just  because  of  Father.  Then  she  would  begin  to  cry  and 
say  it  was  her  own  flesh  and  blood  so  I  just  says  All 
right.  Have  it  your  way.  I  can  stand  it  if  you  can. 

I  fixed  the  letter  up  again  and  glued  it  back  and  went 
out. 

"Try  not  to  be  gone  any  longer  than  you  can  help," 
Earl  says. 

"All  right/'  I  says.  I  went  to  the  telegraph  office.  The 
smart  boys  were  all  there. 

"Any  of  you  boys  made  your  million  yet?"  I  says. 

**Who  can  do  anything,  with  a  market  like  that?"  Doc 
says. 

"What's  it  doing?"  I  says.  I  went  in  and  looked.  It  was 


THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FUBY        235 

three  points  under  the  opening.  **You  boys  are  not  going 
to  let  a  little  thing  like  the  cotton  market  beat  you,  "are 
you?"  I  says.  TL  thought  you  were  too  smart  for  that.** 

"Smart,  hell/'  Doc  says.  "It  was  down  twelve  points  at 
twelve  o'clock.  Cleaned  me  out." 

"Twelve  points?"  I  says.  "Why  the  hell  didn't  some- 
body let  me  know?  Why  didn't  you  let  me  know?"  I 
says  to  the  operator. 

"I  take  it  as  it  comes  in/*  he  says.  *Tm  not  running  a 
bucket  shop/' 

"You're  smart,  aren't  you?"  I  says.  "Seems  to  me,  with 
the  money  I  spend  with  you,  you  could  take  time  to  call 
me  up.  Or  maybe  your  damn  company's  in  a  conspiracy 
with  those  damn  eastern  sharks." 

He  didn't  say  anything.  He  made  like  he  was  busy. 

"You're  getting  a  little  too  big  for  your  pants,"  I  says. 
"First  thing  you  know  you'll  be  working  for  a  living." 

"What's  the  matter  with  you?"  Doc  says.  "You're  still 
three  points  to  the  good." 

"Yes/'  I  says,  "If  I  happened  to  be  selling.  I  haven't 
mentioned  that  yet,  I  think.  You  boys  all  cleaned  out?" 

"I  got  caught  twice/'  Doc  says.  "I  switched  just  in 
time." 

"Well,"  I.  O.  Snopes  says,  "I've  picked  hit;  I  reckon 
taint  no  more  than  fair  fer  hit  to  pick  me  once  in  a 
while." 

So  I  left  them  buying  and  selling  among  themselves  at 
a  nickel  a  point.  I  found  a  nigger  and  sent  him  for  my 
car  and  stood  on  the  corner  and  waited.  I  couldn't  see 
Earl  looking  up  and  down  the  street,  with  one  eye  on 
the  clock,  because  I  couldn't  see  the  door  from  here.  Af * 
ter  about  a  week  he  got  back  with  it. 

"Where  the  hell  have  you  been?"  I  says,  "Riding 
around  where  the  wenches  could  see  you?" 


236'        THE     SOUND      AND      THE      FURY 

"I  come  straight  as  I  could/'  he  says,  "I  had  to  drive 
clean  around  the  square,  wid  all  dem  wagons." 

I  never  found  a  nigger  yet  that  didn't  have  an  airtight 
alibi  for  whatever  he  did.  But  just  turn  one  loose  in  a  car 
and  he's  bound  to  show  off.  I  got  in  and  went  on  around 
the  square.  I  caught  a  glimpse  of  Earl  in  the  door  across 
the  square. 

I  went  straight  to  the  kitchen  and  told  Dilsey  to  hurry 
up  with  dinner. 

"Quentin  aint  come  yit,"  she  says. 

"What  of  that?"  I  says.  "You'll  be  telling  me  next  that 
Luster's  not  quite  ready  to  eat  yet.  Quentin  knows  when 
meals  aae  served  in  this  house.  Hurry  up  with  it,  now." 

Mother  was  in  her  room.  I  gave  her  the  letter.  She 
opened  it  and  took  the  check  out  and  sat  holding  it  in 
her  hand.  I  went  and  got  the  shovel  from  the  corner  and 
gave  her  a  match.  "Come  on/'  I  says,  "Get  it  over  with. 
You'll  be  crying  in  a  minute." 

She  took  the  match,  but  she  didn't  strike  it.  She  sat 
there,  looking  at  the  check.  Just  like  I  said  it  would  be. 

"I  hate  to  do  it,"  she  says,  "To  increase  your  burden  by 
adding  Quentin.  ,  .  ," 

"I  guess  we'll  get  along,"  I  says.  "Come  on.  Get  it  over 
with." 

But  she  just  sat  there,  holding  the  check. 

"This  one  is  on  a  different  bank,"  she  says.  "They  have 
been  on  an  Indianapolis  bank." 

'Yes,'*  I  says.  'Women  are  allowed  to  do  that  too." 

"Do  what?"  she  says. 

"Keep  money  in  two  different  banks,"  I  says. 

"Oh,"  she  says.  She  looked  at  the  check  a  while.  *Tm 
glad  to  know  she's  so  ,  ,  ,  she  has  so  much  .  .  .  God 
sees  that  I  am  doing  right,"  she  says. 

"Come  on,"  1  says,  "Finish  it.  Get  the  fun  over/* 


THE     SOTJXD     AXB     THE     PTTBT 


she  says,  "When  I  think—  * 

"I  thought  you  were  burning  this  two  hundred  dollars 
a  month  for  fun,"  I  says.  "Come  on,  now.  Want  me  to 
strike  the  match?" 

"I  could  bring  myself  to  accept  them/'  she  says,  "For 
my  children's  sake.  I  have  no  pride." 

"You'd  never  "be  satisfied,**  I  says,  "You  know  you 
wouldn't.  You've  settled  that  once,  let  it  stay  settled.  We 
can  get  along." 

"I  leave  everything  to  you/*  she  says.  "But  sometimes  1 
become  afraid  that  in  doing  this  I  am  depriving  you  all 
of  what  is  rightfully  yours.  Perhaps  I  shall  be  punished 
for  it.  If  you  want  me  to,  I  wiH  smother  my  pride  and 
accept  them." 

"What  would  be  the  good  in  beginning  now,  when 
you've  been  destroying  them  for  fifteen  years?*'  I  says. 
"If  you  keep  on  doing  it,  you  have  lost  nothing,  but  if 
you'd  begin  to  take  them  now,  you'll  have  lost  fifty  thou- 
sand dollars.  We've  got  along  so  far,  haven't  we?"  I  says. 
"I  haven't  seen  you  in  the  poorhouse  yet"' 

"Yes/7  she  says,  "We  Bascornbs  need  nobody's  charity. 
Certainly  not  that  of  a  fallen  woman." 

She  struck  the  match  and  lit  the  check  and  put  it  in 
the  shovel,  and  then  the  envelope,  and  watched  them 
burn. 

"You  dont  know  what  it  is,"  she  says,  "Thank  God  you 
will  never  know  what  a  mother  feels," 

There  are  lots  of  women  in  this  world  no  better  than 
her,"  I  says. 

"But  they  are  not  my  daughters,"  she  says.  "It's  not  my- 
self," she  says,  *Td  gladly  take  her  back,  sins,  and  all,  be- 
cause she  Js  my  flesh  and  blood.  It's:  for  Quentin's  sake." 

Well,  I  could  have  said  it  wasn't  much  chance  of  any- 
body hurting  Quentin  much,  but  like  I  say  I  dont  expect 


23$        THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FUSY 

much  but  I  do  want  to  eat  and  sleep  without  a  couple  of 
women  squabbling  and  crying  in  the  house. 

"And  yours/*  she  says.  "I  know  how  you  feel  toward 
her/' 

"Let  her  come  back/*  I  says,  "far  as  I'm  concerned." 

"No/'  she  says,  "I  owe  that  to  your  father's  memory/* 

"When  he  was  trying  all  the  time  to  persuade  you  to 
let  her  come  home  when  Herbert  threw  her  out?"  I  says. 

"You  dont  understand/'  she  says.  "I  know  you  dont 
intend  to  make  it  more  difficult  for  me.  But  it's  my  place 
to  suffer  for  my  children,"  she  says.  "I  can  bear  it* 

"Seems  to  me  you  go  to  a  lot  of  unnecessary  trouble 
doing  it/'  I  says.  The  paper  burned  out.  I  carried  it  to  the 
grate  and  put  it  in.  "It  just  seems  a  shame  to  me  to  burn 
up  good  money/'  I  says. 

"Let  me  never  see  the  day  when  my  children  will  have 
to  accept  that,  the  wages  of  sin/7  she  says.  "I'd  rather  see 
even  you  dead  in  your  coffin  first/" 

"Have  it  your  way/'  I  says,  "Are  we  going  to  have  din- 
aer  soon?"  I  says,  "Because  if  we're  not.  111  have  to  go  on 
back.  We're  pretty  busy  today.3*  She  got  up.  "I've  told 
her  once/*  I  says.  "It  seems  she's  waiting  on  Quentin  or 
Luster  or  somebody.  Here,  I'll  call  her.  Wait."  But  she 
went  to  the  head  of  the  stairs  and  called. 

"Quentin  aint  come  yit/'  Dilsey  says. 

"Well,  111  have  to  get  on  back/'  I  says.  "I  can  get  a 
sandwich  downtown.  I  dont  want  to  interfere  with  Dil- 
sey's  arrangements,"  I  says.  Well,  that  got  her  started 
again,  with  Dilsey  hobbling  and  mumbling  back  and 
forth,  saying, 

"All  right,  all  right,  Ise  puttin  hit  on  fast  as  I  kin." 

"I  try  to  please  you  all,"  Mother  says,  "I  try  to  make 
things  as  easy  for  you  as  I  can." 


THE     SOUND     ANB     THE     FUXY 

Tm  not  complaining,  am  I?"  I  says.  THave  I  said  a 
word  except  I  had  to  go  back  to  work?" 

*1  know,"  she  says,  "I  know  you  haven't  had  the  chance 
the  others  had,  that  you've  had  to  bury  yourself  in  a 
little  country  store.  I  wanted  you  to  get  ahead.  I  knew 
your  father  would  never  realise  that  you  were  the  only 
one  who  had  any  business  sense,  and  then  when  every- 
thing else  failed  I  believed  that  when  she  married,  and 
Herbert  .  .  .  after  his  promise  .  .  /* 

'Well,  he  was  probably  lying  too,"  I  says.  TBe  may  not 
have  even  had  a  bank.  And  if  he  had,  I  dont  reckon  he'd 
have  to  come  all  the  way  to  Mississippi  to  get  a  man  for 

•  •     5> 
it 

We  ate  awhile.  I  could  hear  Ben  in  the  kitchen,  where 
Luster  was  feeding  him.  Like  I  say,  if  we've  got  to  feed 
another  mouth  and  she  wont  take  that  money,  why  not 
send  him  down  to  Jackson.  Hell  be  happier  there,  with 
people  like  him.  I  says  God  knows  there's  little  enough 
room  for  pride  in  this  family,  but  it  dont  take  much  pride 
to  not  like  to  see  a  thirty  year  old  man  playing  around 
the  yard  with  a  nigger  boy,  running  up  and  down  the 
fence  and  lowing  like  a  cow  whenever  they  play  golf 
over  there.  I  says  if  they'd  sent  him  to  Jackson  at  first 
we'd  all  be  better  off  today.  I  says,  you've  done  youi 
duty  by  him;  youVe  done  all  anybody  can  expect  of  you 
and  more  than  most  folks  would  do,  so  why  not  send  him 
there  and  get  that  much  benefit  out  of  the  tares  we  pay. 
Then  she  says,  'Til  be  gone  soon.  I  know  I'm  just  a  bur- 
den to  you"  and  I  says  "You've  been  saying  that  so  long 
that  I'm  beginning  to  believe  you"  only  I  says  you'd  bet- 
ter be  sure  and  not  let  me  know  you're  gone  because 
I'll  sure  have  him  on  number  seventeen  that  night  and 
I  says  I  think  I  know  a  place  where  they'll  take  her  too 


24°        THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FUKT 

and  the  name  of  it's  not  Milk  street  and  Honey  avenue 
either.  Then  she  begun  to  cry  and  I  says  All  right  all 
right  I  have  as  much  pride  about  my  kinfolks  as  any- 
body even  if  I  dont  always  know  where  they  come  from. 

We  ate  for  awhile.  Mother  sent  Dilsey  to  the  front  to 
look  for  Quentin  again. 

"I  keep  telling  you  she's  not  coming  to  dinner/'  I  says. 

"She  knows  better  than  that,"  Mother  says,  "She  knows 
I  dont  permit  her  to  run  about  the  streets  and  not  come 
borne  at  meal  time.  Did  you  look  good,  Dilsey?" 

"Dont  let  her,  then,"  I  says. 

"What  can  I  do,"  she  says.  "You  have  all  of  you  flouted 
me.  Always/' 

"If  you  wouldn't  come  interfering,  I'd  make  her  mind," 
I  says.  "It  wouldn't  take  me  but  about  one  day  to 
straighten  her  out." 

"You'd  be  too  brutal  with  her,"  she  says.  "You  have 
your  Uncle  Maury's  temper." 

That  reminded  me  of  the  letter.  I  took  it  out 
and  handed  it  to  her.  "You  wont  have  to  open  it,"  I  says. 
"The  bank  will  let  you  know  how  much  it  is  this  time." 

"It's  addressed  to  you,"  she  says. 

"Go  on  and  open  it,"  I  says.  She  opened  it  and  read  it 
and  handed  it  to  me. 

dear  young  nephew/  it  says, 


You  will  be  glad  to  learn  that  I  am  now  in  a  posi- 
tion to  avail  myself  of  an  opportunity  regarding  which, 
for  reasons  which  I  will  make  obvious  to  you,  I  shall  not 
go  into  details  until  I  have  an  opportunity  to  divulge  it 
to  you  in  a  more  secure  manner.  My  business  experience 
has  taught  me  to  be  chary  of  committing  anything  of  a 
confidential  nature  to  any  more  concrete  medium  than 
speech,  and  my  extreme  precaution  in  this  instance 


THE     SOUXD     AND     THE     FUHY        241 

should  give  you  some  inkling  of  its  value.  Needless  to 
say,  I  have  just  completed  a  most  exhaustive  examination 
of  all  its  phases,  and  I  feel  no  hesitancy  in  telling  you 
that  it  is  that  sort  of  golden  chance  that  comes  but  once 
in  a  lifetime,  and  I  now  see  clearly  before  me  that  goal 
toward  which  I  have  long  and  unflaggingly  striven:  I.e.* 
the  ultimate  solidification  of  my  affairs  by  which  I  may 
restore  to  its  rightful  position  that  family  of  which  I  have 
the  honour  to  be  the  sole  remaining  male  descendant; 
that  family  In  which  I  have  ever  included  your  lady 
mother  and  her  children. 

*As  it  so  happens,  I  am  not  quite  in  a  position  to  avail 
myself  of  this  opportunity  to  the  uttermost  which  it  war- 
rants,  but  rather  than  go  out  of  the  family  to  do  so,  I  am 
today  drawing  upon  your  Mother's  bank  for  the  small 
sum  necessary  to  complement  my  own  initial  investment, 
for  which  I  herewith  enclose,  as  a  matter  of  formality,  my 
note  of  hand  at  eight  percent  per  annum.  Needless  to 
say,  this  is  merely  a  formality,  to  secure  your  Mother  in 
the  event  of  that  circumstance  of  which  man  is  ever  the 
plaything  and  sport.  For  naturally  I  shall  employ  this 
sum  as  though  it  were  my  own  and  so  permit  your 
Mother  to  avail  herself  of  this  opportunity  which  my  ex- 
haustive investigation  has  shown  to  be  a  bonanza — if 
you  will  permit  the  vulgarism — of  the  first  water  and 
purest  ray  serene. 

This  is  in  confidence,  you  will  understand,  from  one 
business  man  to  another;  we  will  harvest  our  own  vine- 
yards, eh?  And  knowing  your  Mother's  delicate  health 
and  that  timorousness  which  such  delicately  nurtured 
Southern  ladies  would  naturally  feel  regarding  matters  of 
busLisss,  and  their  charming  proneness  to  divulge  unwit- 
tingly such  matters  in  conversation,  I  would  suggest  that 
you  do  not  mention  it  to  her  at  all.  On  second  thought,  I 


THE     SOUSTD     AND     THE     FUKY 

advise  you  not  to  do  so.  It  might  be  better  to  simply  re- 
store this  sum  to  the  bank  at  some  future  date,  say,  in  a 
lump  sum  with  the  other  small  sums  for  which  I  am  in- 
debted to  her,  and  say  nothing  about  it  at  all.  It  is  our 
duty  to  shield  her  from  the  crass  material  world  as  much 
as  possible* 

*Your  affectionate  Uncle, 

*Maury  L.  Bascomb/  " 

"What  do  you  want  to  do  about  it?"  I  says,  flipping  it 
across  the  table. 

"I  know  you  grudge  what  I  give  him,"  she  says. 

"It's  your  money/'  I  says.  *If  you  want  to  throw  it  to 
the  birds  even,  it's  your  business." 

"He's  my  own  brother/'  Mother  says.  "He's  the  last  Bas- 
comb.  When  we  are  gone  there  wont  be  any  more  of 
them." 

'That'll  be  hard  on  somebody,  I  guess/*  I  says.  "All 
right,  all  right,"  I  says,  "It's  your  money.  Do  as  you 
please  with  it.  You  want  me  to  tell  the  bank  to  pay  it?" 

T[  know  you  begrudge  him/'  she  says.  "I  realise  the 
burden  on  your  shoulders.  When  I'm  gone  it  will  be  eas- 
ier on  you/* 

"I  could  make  it  easier  right  now,"  I  says.  ""All  right, 
all  right,  I  wont  mention  it  again.  Move  all  bedlam  in 
here  if  you  want  to." 

"He's  your  own  brother,"  she  says,  "Even  if  he  is  af- 
flicted." 

Til  take  your  bank  book/'  I  says.  "I'll  draw  my 
oheck  today." 

"He  kept  you  waiting  six  days/*  she  says.  "Are  you 
sure  the  business  is  sound?  It  seems  strange  to  me  that  a 
.solvent  business  cannot  pay  its  employees  promptly." 

"He's  all  right/'  I  says,  "Safe  as  a  bank.  I  tell  him  not  to 


THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FURY 

bother  about  mine  until  we  get  done  collecting  every 
month.  That's  why  it's  late  sometimes.** 

"I  just  couldn't  bear  to  have  you  lose  the  little  I  had  to 
invest  for  you,"  she  says.  "I've  often  thought  that  Earl  is 
not  a  good  business  man.  T  know  he  doesn't  take  you 
into  his  confidence  to  the  extent  that  your  investment 
in  the  business  should  warrant  I'm  going  to  speak  to 
him/* 

"No,  you  let  him  alone/'  I  says.  'It's  his  business." 

"You  have  a  thousand  dollars  in  it." 

'Ton  let  him  alone/'  I  says,  'Tm  watching  things.  1 
iiave  your  power  of  attorney.  It'll  be  all  right." 

"You  dont  know  what  a  comfort  you  are  to  me,"  she 
says.  "You  have  always  been  my  pride  and  joy,  but  when 
you  came  to  rne  of  your  own  accord  and  insisted  on 
banking  your  salary  each  month  in  my  name,  I  thanked 
God  it  was  you  left  me  if  they  had  to  be  taken." 

"They  were  all  right,"  I  says.  "They  did  the  best  they 
could,  I  reckon." 

"When  you  talk  that  way  I  know  you  are  thinking  bit- 
terly of  your  father's  memory/*  she  says.  "You  have  a 
right  to,  I  suppose.  But  it  breaks  rny  heart  to  hear  you." 

I  got  up.  "If  you've  got  any  crying  to  do,"  I  says,  "you'll 
have  to  do  it  alone,  because  IVe  got  to  get  on  back.  Ill 
get  the  bank  book." 

Til  get  it/'  she  says. 

"Keep  still/'  I  says,  "I'll  get  it."  I  went  upstairs  and  got 
the  bank  book  out  of  her  desk  and  went  back  to  town. 
I  went  to  the  bank  and  deposited  the  check  and  the 
money  order  and  the  other  ten,  and  stopped  at  the  tele- 
graph office.  It  was  one  point  above  the  opening.  I  had 
already  lost  thirteen  points,  all  because  she  had  to  come 
helling  in  there  at  twelve,  worrying  me  about  that  letter, 

"What  time  did  that  report  come  in?"  I  says. 


*44        THE     SOUND      AND     THE 

"About  an  hour  ago/'  hie  says. 

"An  hour  ago?"  I  says.  "What  are  we  paying  you 
I  says,  'Weekly  reports?  How  do  you  expect  a  man  to  do 
anything?  The  whole  damn  top  could  blow  off  and  we'd 
not  know  it" 

"I  dont  expect  you  to  do  anything/'  he  says.  "They 
changed  that  law  making  folks  play  die  cotton  market** 

'They  have/7  I  says.  "I  hadn't  heard.  They  must  have 
sent  the  news  out  over  the  Western  Union/" 

I  went  back  to  the  store.  Thirteen  points.  Damn  if  I 
believe  anybody  knows  anything  about  the  damn  thing 
except  the  ones  that  sit  back  in  those  New  York  offices 
and  watch  the  country  suckers  come  up  and  beg  them  to 
take  their  money.  Well,  a  man  that  just  calls  shows  he 
has  no  faith  in  himself*  and  like  I  say  if  you  aren't  going 
to  take  the  advice,  what's  the  use  in  paying  money  for  it 
Besides,  these  people  are  right  up  there  on  the  ground; 
they  know  everything  that's  going  on.  I  could  feel  the 
telegram  in  rny  pocket.  I'd  just  have  to  prove  that  they 
were  using  the  telegraph  company  to  defraud.  That 
would  constitute  a  bucket  shop.  And  I  wouldn't  hesitate 
that  long,  either.  Only  be  damned  if  it  doesn't  look  like 
a  company  as  big  and  rich  as  the  Western  Union  could 
get  a  market  report  out  on  time.  Half  as  quick  as  they'll 
get  a  wire  to  you  saying  Your  account  closed  out.  But 
what  the  hell  do  they  care  about  the  people.  They're 
hand  in  glove  with  that  New  York  crowd.  Anybody 
could  see  that. 

When  I  came  in  Earl  looked  at  his  watch.  But  he  didn't 
say  anything  until  the  customer  was  gone.  Then  he  says, 

"You  go  home  to  dinner?" 

*1  had  to  go  to  the  dentist/*  I  says  because  it's  not  any 
of  his  business  where  I  eat  but  I've  got  to  be  in  the  store 
with  him  all  the  afternoon.  And  with  his  jaw  running;  08 


THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FUKY        245 

after  all  I've  stood.  You  take  a  little  two  by  four  country 
storekeeper  like  I  say  it  takes  a  man  with  just  five  hun- 
dred dollars  to  worry  about  it  fifty  thousand  dol- 
lars* worth. 

"You  might  have  told  me/'  he  says.  "I  expected  you 
back  right  away." 

"I'll  trade  you  this  tooth  and  give  you  ten  dollars  to 
boot,  any  time,"  I  says.  "Our  agreement  was  an  hour  for 
dinner/*  I  says,  "and  if  you  dont  like  the  way  I  do,  you 
know  what  you  can  do  about  it." 

"I've  known  that  some  time/*  he  says.  "If  it  hadn't  been 
for  your  mother  I'd  have  done  it  before  now,  too.  She's  a 
lady  I've  got  a  lot  of  sympathy  for,  Jason.  Too  bad 
some  other  folks  I  know  cant  say  as  much." 

'Then  you  can  keep  it/'  I  says.  "When  we  need  any 
sympathy  111  let  you  know  in  plenty  of  time/' 

"I've  protected  you  about  that  business  a  long  time, 
Jason/'  he  says. 

"Yes?"  I  says,  letting  him  go  on.  Listening  to  what  h0 
would  say  before  I  shut  him  up. 

"I  believe  I  know  more  about  where  that  automobile 
came  from  than  she  does." 

"You  think  so,  do  you?"  I  says.  "When  are  you  going 
to  spread  the  news  that  I  stole  it  from  my  mother?" 

*1  dont  say  anything/'  he  says,  "I  know  you  have  hex 
power  of  attorney.  And  I  know  she  still  believes  that 
thousand  dollars  is  in  this  business/' 

"All  right/'  I  says,  "Since  you  know  so  much,  111  tell 
you  a  little  more:  go  to  the  bank  and  ask  them  whose  ac- 
count I've  been  depositing  a  hundred  and  sixty  dollars 
on  the  first  of  every  month  for  twelve  years." 

"I  dont  say  anything,"  he  says,  "I  just  ask  you  to  be  a 
little  more  careful  after  this." 

I  never  said  anything  more.  It  doesn't  do  any  good. 


THE     SOUND      AND      THE      FURY 

I've  found  that  when  a  man  gets  into  a  nit  the  best  thing 
yon  can  do  is  let  him  stay  there.  And  when  a  man  gets  it 
in  his  head  that  he's  got  to  tell  something  on  you  for 
your  own  good,  good-night.  I'm  glad  I  haven't  got  the 
sort  of  conscience  I've  got  to  nurse  like  a  sick  puppy  all 
the  time.  If  I'd  ever  be  as  careful  over  anything  as  lie  is 
to  keep  his  little  shirt  tail  full  of  business  from  making 
him  more  than  eight  percent.  I  reckon  he  thinks  they'd 
get  him  on  the  usury  law  if  he  netted  more  than  eight 
percent.  What  the  hell  chance  has  a  man  got,  tied  down 
in  a  town  like  this  and  to  a  business  like  this.  Why  I 
could  take  his  business  in  one  year  and  fix  him  so  he'd 
never  have  to  work  again,  only  he'd  give  it  ail  away  to 
the  church  or  something.  If  there's  one  thing  gets  under 
my  skin,  it's  a  damn  hypocrite.  A  man  that  thinks  any- 
thing he  dont  understand  all  about  must  be  crooked  and 
that  first  chance  he  gets  he's  morally  bound  to  tell  the 
third  party  what's  none  of  his  business  to  tell.  Like  I  say 
if  I  thought  every  time  a  man  did  something  I  didn't 
know  all  about  he  was  bound  to  be  a  crook,  I  reckon  I 
Wouldn't  have  any  trouble  finding  something  back  there 
on  those  books  that  you  wouldn't  see  any  use  for  running 
and  telling  somebody  I  thought  ought  to  know  about  it, 
when  for  all  I  knew  they  might  know  a  damn  sight  more 
about  it  now  than  I  did,  and  if  they  didn't  it  was  damn 
little  of  my  business  anyway  and  he  says,  "My  books  are 
open  to  anybody.  Anybody  that  has  any  claim  or  be- 
lieves she  has  any  claim  on  this  business  can  go  back 
there  and  welcome." 

"Sure,  you  wont  tell,"  I  says,  "You  couldn't  square  your 
conscience  with  that.  You'll  just  take  her  back  there  and 
let  her  find  it.  You  wont  tell,  yourself.9* 

Tm  not  trying  to  meddle  in  your  business/'  he  says. 
'1  know  you  i>Jssed  out  on  some  things  like  Quentin  had. 


THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FURY 

But  your  mother  has  had  a  misfortunate  life  too,  and  if 
she  was  to  come  in  here  and  ask  me  why  you  quit,  I'd 
have  to  tell  her.  It  aiiit  that  thousand  dollars.  You  know 
that  It's  because  a  man  never  gets  anywhere  if  fact  and 
his  ledgers  dont  square.  And  I'm  not  going  to  lie  to  any- 
body., for  myself  or  anybody  else." 

"Well,  then/'  I  says,  "I  reckon  that  conscience  of  yours 
is  a  more  valuable  clerk  than  I  am;  it  dont  have  to  gtf 
home  at  noon  to  eat.  Only  dont  let  it  interfere  with  my 
appetite/'  I  says,  because  how  the  hell  can  I  do  anything 
right,  with  that  damn  family  and  her  not  making  any 
effort  to  control  her  nor  any  of  them,  like  that  time  when 
she  happened  to  see  one  of  them  kissing  Caddy  and  all 
next  day  she  went  around  the  house  in  a  black  dress  and 
a  veil  and  even  Father  couldn't  get  her  to  say  a  word  ex- 
cept crying  and  saying  her  little  daughter  was  dead  and 
Caddy  about  fifteen  then  only  in  three  years  she'd  been 
wearing  haircloth  or  probably  sandpaper  at  that  rate.  Do 
you  think  I  can  afford  to  have  her  running  about  the 
streets  with  every  drummer  that  comes  to  town,  I  says, 
and  them  telling  the  new  ones  up  and  down  the  road 
where  to  pick  up  a  hot  one  when  they  made  Jefferson.  I 
haven't  got  much  pride,  I  can't  afford  it  with  a  kitchen 
full  of  niggers  to  feed  and  robbing  the  state  asylum  of  its 
star  freshman.  Blood,  I  says,  governors  and  generals.  It's 
a  damn  good  thing  we  never  had  any  kings  and  presi- 
dents; we'd  all  be  down  there  at  Jackson  chasing  bu%» 
terflies.  I  say  it'd  be  bad  enough  if  it  was  mine;  I'd  at 
least  be  sure  it  was  a  bastard  to  begin  with,  and  now 
even  the  Lord  doesn't  know  that  for  certain  probably. 

So  after  awhile  I  heard  the  band  start  up,  and  then 
they  begun  to  clear  out  Headed  for  the  show,  every  one 
of  them.  Haggling  over  a  twenty  cent  hame  string  to  save 
fifteen  cents,  so  they  can  give  it  to  a  bunch  of  Yankees 


THE     SOUND     AND     THE 

that  come  in  and  pay  maybe  ten  dollars  for  the  privilege. 
I  went  on  out  to  the  back, 

"Well"  I  says,  "If  you  dont  look  out,  that  bolt  will 
grow  into  your  hand.  And  then  I'm  going  to  take  an  axe 
and  chop  it  out.  What  do  you  reckon  the  boll-weeviisll 
eat  if  you  dont  get  those  cultivators  in  shape  to  raise 
them  a  crop?"  I  says,  "sage  grass?" 

"Dem  folks  sho  do  play  dem  horns/*  he  says.  "Tell  me 
man  in  dat  show  kin  play  a  tune  on  a  handsaw.  Pick  hit 
like  a  banjo/* 

"Listen,"  I  says.  "Do  you  know  how  much  that  showTl 
spend  in  this  town?  About  ten  dollars/*  I  says.  "The  ten 
dollars  Buck  Turpin  has  in  his  pocket  right  now/* 

"Whut  dey  give  Mr  Buck  ten  dollars  fer?"  he  says. 

"For  the  privilege  of  showing  here/*  I  says,  "You  can 
put  the  balance  of  what  they'll  spend  in  your  eye/* 

"You  mean  dey  pays  ten  dollars  jest  to  give  dey  show 
here?**  he  says. 

"That's  all/*  I  says.  "And  how  much  do  you 
reckon  .  .  /* 

"Gret  day/*  he  says,  "You  mean  to  tell  me  dey  chargin 
tun  to  let  urn  show  here?  I'd  pay  ten  dollars  to  see  dat 
man  pick  dat  saw,  ef  I  had  to.  I  figures  dat  tomorrow 
mawnin  I  be  still  owin  urn  nine  dollars  and  six  bits  at 
dat  rate/* 

And  then  a  Yankee  will  talk  your  head  off  about  nig- 
gers getting  ahead.  Get  them  ahead,  what  I  say.  Get  them 
so  far  ahead  you  cant  find  one  south  of  Louisville  with  a 
blood  hound.  Because  when  I  told  him  about  how  they'd 
pick  up  Saturday  night  and  carry  off  at  least  a  thousand 
dollars  out  of  the  county,  he  says, 

"I  dont  begrudge  um.  I  kin  sho  afford  my  two  bits." 

"Two  bits  hell/'  I  says.  "That  dont  begin  it.  How  about 
the  dime  or  fifteen  cents  you'll  spend  for  a  damn  two  cent 


THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FURY        249 

box  of  candy  or  something.  How  about  the  time  you're 
wasting  right  now,  listening  to  that  band." 

TDat's  de  troof/'  he  says.  "Well,  ef  I  lives  tweU  night 
hit's  gwine  to  be  two  bits  mo  dey  takin  out  of  town,  dat's 
sho/' 

"Then  you're  a  fool/*  I  says, 

"Well/'  he  says,  "I  dont  spute  dat  neither.  Ef  dat  uz 
a  crime,  all  chain-gangs  wouldn't  be  black/7 

Well,  just  about  that  time  I  happened  to  look  up  the 
alley  and  saw  her.  When  I  stepped  back  and  looked  at 
my  watch  I  didn't  notice  at  the  time  who  he  was  because 
I  was  looking  at  the  watch.  It  was  just  two  thirty,  forty- 
five  minutes  before  anybody  but  me  expected  her  to  be 
out.  So  when  I  looked  around  the  door  the  first  thing  I 
saw  was  the  red  tie  he  had  on  and  I  was  thinking  what 
the  hell  kind  of  a  man  would  wear  a  red  tie.  But  she  was 
sneaking  along  the  alley,  watching  the  door,  so  I  wasn't 
thinking  anything  about  him  until  they  had  gone  past*  I 
was  wondering  if  she'd  have  so  little  respect  for  me  that 
she'd  not  only  play  out  of  school  when  I  told  her  not  to. 
but  would  walk  right  past  the  store,  daring  me  not  to  see 
her.  Only  she  couldn't  see  into  the  door  because  the  sun 
fell  straight  into  it  and  it  was  like  trying  to  see  through 
an  automobile  searchlight,  so  I  stood  there  and  watched 
her  go  on  past,  with  her  face  painted  up  like  a  damn 
clown's  and  her  hair  all  gummed  and  twisted  and  a  dress 
that  if  a  woman  had  come  out  doors  even  on  Gayoso  or 
Beale  street  when  I  was  a  young  fellow  with  no  more 
than  that  to  cover  her  legs  and  behind,  she'd  been 
thrown  in  jail.  I'll  be  damned  if  they  dont  dress  like  they 
were  trying  to  make  every  man  they  passed  on  the  street 
want  to  reach  out  and  clap  his  hand  on  it.  And  so  I  was 
thinking  what  kind  of  a  damn  man  would  wear  a  red  tie 
when  all  of  a  sudden  I  knew  he  was  one  of  those  show 


250        THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FUBY 

folks  well  as  if  she'd  told  me.  Well,  I  can  stand  a  lot;  if 
I  couldn't,  damn  if  I  wouldn't  be  in  a  hell  of  a  fix,  so 
when  they  turned  the  corner  I  jumped  down  and  fol- 
lowed. Me,  without  any  hat,  in  the  middle  of  the  after- 
noon, having  to  chase  up  and  down  back  alleys  because 
of  my  mother's  good  name.  Like  I  say  you  cant  do  any- 
thing with  a  woman  like  that,  if  she's  got  it  in  her.  If  it's 
in  her  blood,  you  cant  do  anything  with  her.  The  only 
thing  you  can  do  is  to  get  rid  of  her,  let  her  go  on  and 
live  with  her  own  sort. 

I  went  on  to  the  street,  but  they  were  out  of  sight. 
And  there  I  was,  without  any  hat,  looking  like  I  was 
crazy  too.  Like  a  man  would  naturally  think,  one  of 
them,  is  crazy  and  another  one  drowned  himself  and  the 
other  one  was  turned  out  into  the  street  by  her  husband, 
what's  the  reason  the  rest  of  them  are  not  crazy  too.  All 
the  time  I  could  see  them  watching  me  like  a  hawk,  wait- 
ing for  a  chance  to  say  Well  I'm  not  surprised  I  expected 
it  all  the  time  the  whole  family's  crazy.  Selling  land  to 
send  him  to  Harvard  and  paying  taxes  to  support  a  state 
University  all  the  time  that  I  never  saw  except  twice  at  a 
baseball  game  and  not  letting  her  daughter's  name  be 
spoken  on  the  place  until  after  a  while  Father  wouldn't 
even  come  down  town  anymore  but  just  sat  there  all  day 
with  the  decanter  I  could  see  the  bottom  of  his  night- 
shirt and  his  bare  legs  and  hear  the  decanter  clinking  un- 
til finally  T.  P.  had  to  pour  it  for  him  and  she  says  You 
have  no  respect  for  your  Father's  memory  and  I  says  I 
dont  know  why  not  it  sure  is  preserved  well  enough  to 
last  only  if  I'm  crazy  too  God  knows  what  111  do 
about  it  just  to  look  at  water  makes  me  sick  and  I'd  just 
as  soon  swallow  gasoline  as  a  glass  of  whiskey  and  Lor- 
raine telling  them  he  may  not  drink  but  if  you  dont  be- 
lieve he's  a  man  I  can  tell  you  how  to  find  out  she  says  If 


THE     SOUKB     AND     TH"E     FURY        Zfl 

I  catch  you  fooling  with  any  of  these  whores  you  know 
what  111  do  she  says  1*11  whip  her  grabbing  at  her  111 
whip  her  as  long  as  I  can  find  her  she  says  and  I  says  if 
I  dont  drink  that's  my  business  but  have  you  ever  found 
me  short  I  says  I'll  buy  you  enough  beer  to  take  a 
bath  in  if  you  want  it  because  I've  got  every  respect  for  a 
good  honest  whore  because  with  Mother's  health  and  the 
position  I  try  to  uphold  to  have  her  with  no  more  respect 
for  what  I  fay  to  do  for  her  than  to  make  her  name  and 
my  name  and  my  Mother's  name  a  byword  in  the  town. 

She  had  dodged  out  of  sight  somewhere.  Saw  me  com- 
ing and  dodged  into  another  alley,  running  up  and  down 
the  alleys  with  a  damn  show  man  in  a  red  tie  that  every- 
body would  look  at  and  think  what  kind  of  a  damn  man 
would  wear  a  red  tie.  Well,  the  boy  kept  speaking  to  me 
and  so  I  took  the  telegram  without  knowing  I  had  taken 
it.  I  didn't  realise  what  it  was  until  I  was  signing  for  it, 
and  I  tore  it  open  without  even  caring  much  what  it  was, 
I  knew  all  the  time  what  it  would  be,  I  reckon.  That  was 
the  only  thing  else  that  could  happen,  especially  holding 
it  up  until  I  had  already  had  the  check  entered  on  the 
pass  book. 

I  don't  see  how  a  city  no  bigger  than  New  York  can 
hold  enough  people  to  take  the  money  away  from  us 
country  suckers.  Work  like  hell  all  day  every  day,  send 
them  your  money  and  get  a  little  piece  of  paper  back, 
Your  account  closed  at  20.62.  Teasing  you  along,  letting 
you  pile  up  a  little  paper  profit,  then  bang!  Your  account 
closed  at  20.62.  And  if  that  wasn't  enough,  paying  ten 
dollars  a  month  to  somebody  to  tell  you  how  to  lose  it 
fast,  'that  either  dont  know  anything  about  it  or  is  in  ca- 
hoots with  the  telegraph  company.  Well,  I'm  done  with 
them.  They've  sucked  me  in  for  the  last  time.  Any  fool 
except  a  fellow  that  hasn't  got  any  more  sense  than  to 


TEE     SOUND     AND     THE     FURY 

take  a  Jew's  word  for  anything  could  tell  the  market  was 
going  up  all  the  time,  with  the  whole  damn  delta  about 
to  be  flooded  again  and  the  cotton  washed  right  out  of 
the  ground  like  it  was  last  year.  Let  it  wash  a  man's 
crop  out  of  the  ground  year  after  year,  and  them  up  there 
in  Washington  spending  fifty  thousand  dollars  a  day 
keeping  an  army  in  Nicaragua  or  some  place.  Of  course 
ifli  overflow  again,  and  then  cottonH  be  worth  thirty 
cents  a  pound.  Well,  I  just  want  to  hit  them  one  time  and 
get  my  money  back.  I  don't  want  a  killing;  only  these 
.small  town  gamblers  are  out  for  that,  I  just  want  my 
money  back  that  these  damn  jews  have  gotten  with  all 
their  guaranteed  inside  dope.  Then  I'm  through;  they  can 
kiss  my  foot  for  every  other  red  cent  of  mine  they  get 

I  went  back  to  the  store.  It  was  half  past  three  almost. 
Damn  little  time  to  do  anything  in,  but  then  I  am  used 
to  that.  I  never  had  to  go  to  Harvard  to  learn  that.  The 
band  had  quit  playing.  Got  them  all  inside  now,  and  they 
wouldn't  have  to  waste  any  more  wind.  Earl  says, 

"He  found  you,  did  he?  He  was  in  here  with  it  a  while 
ago.  I  thought  you  were  out  back  somewhere." 

"Yes/'  I  says,  "I  got  it.  They  couldn't  keep  it  away  from 
me  all  afternoon.  The  town's  too  small.  I've  got  to  go  out 
home  a  minute,"  I  says.  "You  can  dock  me  if  it'll  make 
you  feel  any  better." 

"Go  ahead,"  he  says,  "I  can  handle  it  now.  No  bad 
news,  I  hope." 

"You'll  have  to  go  to  the  telegraph  office  and  find  that 
out/'  I  says.  "They'll  have  time  to  tell  you.  I  haven't/* 

"I  just  asked,"  he  says.  "Your  mother  knows  she  can 
depend  on  me/' 

"She'll  appreciate  it/*  I  says,  "I  wont  be  gone  any 
longer  than  I  have  to," 


*HE     SOtT^B     AND 

Take  your  time/'  be  says.  "I  can  handle  it  now.  You 
go  ahead." 

I  got  the  car  and  went  home.  Once  this  morning,  twice 
at  noon,  and  now  again,  with  her  and  having  to  chase  all 
over  town  and  having  to  beg  them  to  let  me  eat  a  little  of 
the  food  I  am  paying  for.  Sometimes  I  think  what's  the 
use  of  anything.  With  the  precedent  I've  been  set  I  must 
be  crazy  to  keep  on.  And  now  I  reckon  I'll  get  home  Just 
in  time  to  take  a  nice  long  drive  after  a  basket  of  toma- 
toes or  something  and  then  have  to  go  back  to  town 
smelling  like  a  camphor  factory  so  my  head  wont  explode 
right  on  my  shoulders.  I  keep  telling  her  there's  not  a 
damn  thing  in  that  aspirin  except  flour  and  water  for 
imaginary  invalids.  I  says  you  dont  know  what  a  head- 
ache is.  I  says  you  think  I'd  fool  with  that  damn  car  at 
all  if  it  depended  on  me.  I  says  I  can  get  along  without 
one  IVe  learned  to  get  along  without  lots  of  things  but 
if  you  want  to  risk  yourself  in  that  old  wornout  surrey 
with  a  halfgrown  nigger  boy  all  right  because  I  says 
God  looks  after  Ben's  kind,  God  knows  He  ought  to  do 
something  for  him  but  if  you  think  I'm  going  to  trust  a 
thousand  dollars'  worth  of  delicate  machinery  to  a  half- 
grown  nigger  or  a  grown  one  either,  you'd  better  buy 
him  one  yourself  because  I  says  you  like  to  ride  in  the 
car  and  you  know  you  do. 

Dilsey  said  Mother  was  in  the  house.  I  went  on  into 
the  hall  and  listened,  but  I  didn't  hear  anything.  I  went 
up  stairs,  but  just  as  I  passed  her  door  she  called  me. 

"I  just  wanted  to  know  who  it  was,w  she  says.  Tim 
here  alone  so  much  that  I  hear  every  sound.'* 

"You  dont  have  to  stay  here/'  I  says.  "You  could  spend 
the  whole  day  visiting  like  other  women,  if  you  wanted 
to/9  She  came  to  the  door. 


254        THE     SOUND     AND     THE 

"I  thought  maybe  you  were  sick/'  she  says.  "Having  to 
hurry  through  your  dinner  like  you  did." 

"Better  luck  next  time/'  I  says.  "What  do  you  want?** 

"Is  anything  wrong?"  she  says. 

"What  could  be?"  I  says.  "Cant  I  come  home  in  the 
middle  of  the  afternoon  without  upsetting  the  whole 
house?" 

'Have  you  seen  Quentin?"  she  says. 

"She's  in  school,"  I  says. 

'It's  after  three,"  she  says.  "I  heard  the  clock  strike  at 
least  a  half  an  hour  ago.  She  ought  to  be  home  by  now/* 

"Ought  she?"  I  says.  '"When  have  you  ever  seen  her 
before  dark?" 

"She  ought  to  be  home,"  she  says.  ""When  I  was  a 
girl  .  .  /' 

**You  had  somebody  to  make  you  behave  yourself/*  I 
says.  "She  hasn't/* 

"I  can't  do  anything  with  her/'  she  says.  "I've  tried  and 
IVe  tried/' 

"And  you  wont  let  me,  for  some  reason/'  I  says,  "Sc 
you  ought  to  be  satisfied/'  I  went  on  to  my  room.  I  turned 
the  key  easy  and  stood  there  until  the  knob  turned.  Then 
she  says, 

"Jason." 

"What,"  I  says. 

"1  just  thought  something  was  wrong/* 

"Not  in  here/'  I  says.  Tou've  come  to  the  wrong  place/3 

"I  dont  mean  to  worry  you/*  she  says. 

*Tra  glad  to  hear  that/*  I  says.  "I  wasn't  sure.  I  thought 
1  might  have  been  mistaken.  Do  you  want  anything?" 

After  awhile  she  says,  "No.  Not  any  thing."  Then  she 
went  away.  I  took  the  box  down  and  counted  out  the 
money  and  hid  the  box  again  and  unlocked  the  door  and 
went  out.  I  thought  about  the  camphor,  but  it  would  be 


THE     SOUND     A3STB     THTfi     FURY        255 

too  late  now,  anyway.  And  I'd  just  have  one  more  round 
trip.  She  was  at  her  door,  waiting. 

"You  want  anything  from  townF'  I  says. 

"No/'  she  says.  *I  dont  mean  to  meddle  in  your  affairs* 
But  I  dont  know  what  I'd  do  if  anything  happened  to 
you,  Jason." 

"I'm  all  right,"  I  says.  "Just  a  headache." 

*1  wish  you'd  take  some  aspirin,**  she  says.  "I  know 
you're  not  going  to  stop  using  the  car." 

'What's  the  car  got  to  do  with  it?"  I  says.  "How  can  a 
car  give  a  man  a  headache?" 

<tfYou  know  gasoline  always  made  you  sick,"  she  says. 
"Ever  since  you.  were  a  child.  I  wish  you'd  take  some 
aspirin." 

"Keep  on  wishing  it,"  I  says.  "It  wont  hurt  you." 

I  got  in  the  car  and  started  back  to  town.  I  had  just 
turned  onto  the  street  when  I  saw  a  ford  coming  helling 
toward  me.  All  of  a  sudden  it  stopped.  I  could  hear  the 
wheels  sliding  and  it  slewed  around  and  backed  and 
whirled  and  just  as  I  was  thinking  what  the  hell  they 
were  up  to,  I  saw  that  red  tie.  Then  I  recognised  her  face 
looking  back  through  the  window.  It  whirled  into  the 
alley.  I  saw  it  turn  again,  but  when  I  got  to  the  back 
street  it  was  just  disappearing,  running  Hke  hell. 

I  saw  red.  When  I  recognised  that  red  tie,  after  all  I 
had  told  her,  I  forgot  about  everything.  I  never  thought 
about  my  head  even  until  I  came  to  the  first  forks  and 
had  to  stop.  Yet  we  spend  money  and  spend  money  on 
roads  and  damn  if  it  isn't  like  trying  to  drive  over  a 
sheet  of  corrugated  iron  roofing.  Id  like  to  know  how  a 
man  could  be  expected  to  keep  up  with  even  a  wheel- 
barrow. I  think  too  much  of  my  car;  I'm  not  going  to 
hammer  it  to  pieces  like  it  was  a  ford,  Chances  were  they 
had  stolen  it,  anyway,  so  why  should  they  give  a  damn 


THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FURY 

I  say  blood  always  tells.  If  you've  got  blood  like 
that  in  you,  you'll  do  anything.  I  says  whatever  claim  you 
believe  she  has  on  you  has  already  been  discharged;  I 
says  from  now  on  you  have  only  yourself  to  blame  be- 
cause you  know  what  any  sensible  person  would  do.  I 
says  if  IVe  got  to  spend  half  my  time  being  a  damn  de- 
tective, at  least  111  go  where  I  can  get  paid  for  it. 

So  1  had  to  stop  there  at  the  forks.  Then  I  remembered 
it  It  felt  like  somebody  was  inside  with  a  hammer,  beat- 
ing on  it.  I  says  IVe  tried  to  keep  you  from  being  wor- 
ried by  her;  I  says  far  as  I'm  concerned,  let  her  go  to  hell 
as  fast  as  she  pleases  and  the  sooner  the  better.  I  says 
what  else  do  you  expect  except  every  drummer  and 
cheap  show  that  comes  to  town  because  even  these  town 
jellybeans  give  her  the  go-by  now.  You  dont  know  what 
goes  on  I  says,  you  dont  hear  the  talk  that  I  hear  and  you 
can  just  bet  I  shut  them  up  too.  I  says  my  people  owned 
slaves  here  when  you  all  were  running  little  shirt  tail 
country  stores  and  farming  land  no  nigger  would  look  at 
on  shares. 

If  they  ever  fanned  it.  It's  a  good  thing  the  Lord  did 
something  for  this  country;  the  folks  that  Jive  on  it  never 
have.  Friday  afternoon,  and  from  right  here  I  could  see 
three  miles  of  land  that  hadn't  even  been  broken,  and 
every  able  bodied  man  in  the  county  in  town  at  that 
show,  I  might  have  been  a  stranger  starving  to  death, 
and  there  wasn't  a  soul  in  sight  to  ask  which  way  to  town 
even.  And  she  trying  to  get  me  to  take  aspirin.  I  says 
when  I  eat  bread  I'll  do  it  at  the  table.  I  says  you  always 
talking  about  how  much  you  give  up  for  us  when  yots 
could  buy  ten  new  dresses  a  year  on  the  money  you 
spend  for  those  damn  patent  medicines.  It's  not  some-' 
thing  to  cure  it  I  need  it's  just  an  even  break  not  to  have 
to  have  them  but  as  long  as  I  have  to  work  ten  hours  a 


THE        OUXD     AND     THE     FURY 


day  to  support  a  kitchen  full  of  niggers  in  the  style 
they're  accustomed  to  and  send  them  to  the  stow  with 
every  other  nigger  in  the  county,  only  he  W93  late  al- 
ready. By  the  time  he  got  there  it  would  be  over. 

After  awhile  he  got  up  to  the  car  and  when  I  final]1? 
got  it  through  his  head  if  two  people  in  a  ford  had  passed 
him,  he  said  yes.  So  I  went  on,  and  when  I  came  to  where 
the  wagon  road  turned  off  I  could  see  the  tire  tracks.  Ab 
Russell  was  in  his  lot,  but  I  didn't  bother  to  ask  him  and 
I  hadn't  got  out  of  sight  of  his  bam  hardly  when  I  saw 
the  ford.  They  had  tried  to  hide  it.  Done  about  as  well  at 
it  as  she  did  at  everything  else  she  did.  Like  I  say  it's  not 
that  I  object  to  so  much;  maybe  she  cant  help  that,  it's 
because  she  hasn't  even  got  enough  consideration  for  her 
own  family  to  have  any  discretion.  I'm  afraid  all  the  time 
I'll  run  into  them  right  in  the  middle  of  the  street  or  un- 
der a  wagon  on  the  square,  like  a  couple  of  dogs. 

I  parked  and  got  out.  And  now  I'd  have  to  go  way 
around  and  cross  a  plowed  field,  the  only  one  I  had  seen 
since  I  left  town,  with  every  step  like  somebody  wa? 
walking  along  behind  me,  hitting  me  on  the  head  with 
a  club.  I  kept  thinking  that  when  I  got  across  the  field  at 
least  I'd  have  something  level  tc  walk  on,  that  wouldn't 
jolt  me  every  step,  but  when  I  got  into  the  woods  it  was 
full  of  underbrush  and  I  had  to  twist  around  through  it, 
and  then  I  came  to  a  ditch  full  of  briers.  I  went  along  it 
for  awhile,  but  it  got  thicker  and  thicker,  and  all  the  time 
Earl  probably  telephoning  home  about  where  I  was  and 
getting  Mother  all  upset  again. 

When  I  finally  got  through  I  had  had  to  wind  around 
so  much  that  I  had  to  stop  and  figure  out  just  where  the 
car  would  be.  I  knew  they  wouldn't  be  far  from  it,  just 
under  the  closest  bush,  so  I  turned  and  worked  back  to- 
ward the  road.  Then  I  couldn't  tell  just  how  far  I  was,  so 


THE  SOtJtfD  AND  THE  FUBY 
I'd  have  to  stop  and  listen,  and  then  with  my  legs  not  us- 
ing so  much  blood,  it  all  would  go  into  my  head  like  it 
would  explode  any  minute,  and  the  sun  getting  down 
Just  to  where  it  could  shine  straight  into  my  eyes  and  my 
ears  ringing  so  I  couldn't  hear  anything.  I  went  on,  try- 
ing to  move  quiet,  then  I  heard  a  dog  or  something  and 
I  knew  that  when  he  scented  me  he'd  have  to  come  hell- 
ing up,  then  it  would  be  all  off. 

I  had  gotten  beggar  lice  and  t^igs  and  stuff  all  over 
me,  inside  my  clothes  and  shoes  and  all,  and  then  I  hap- 
pened to  look  around  and  I  had  my  hand  right  on 
a  bunch  of  poison  oak.  The  only  thing  I  couldn't  under- 
stand was  why  it  was  just  poison  oak  and  not  a  snake  or 
something.  So  I  didn't  even  bother  to  move  it  I  just  stood 
there  until  the  dog  went  away.  Then  I  went  on. 

I  didn't  have  any  idea  where  the  car  was  now.  I 
couldn't  think  about  anything  except  my  head,  and  I'd 
just  stand  in  one  place  and  sort  of  wonder  if  I  had  really 
seen  a  ford  even,  and  I  didn't  even  care  much  whether  I 
had  or  not.  Like  I  say,  let  her  lay  out  all  day  and  all  night 
with  everything  in  town  that  wears  pants,  what  do  I  care. 
I  dont  owe  anything  to  anybody  that  has  no  more 
consideration  for  me,  that  wouldn't  be  a  damn  bit  above 

planting  that  ford  there  and  making  me  spend  a  whole 
afternoon  and  Earl  taking  her  back  there  and  showing 
her  the  books  just  because  he's  too  damn  virtuous  for  this 

vorld.  I  says  you'll  have  one  hell  of  a  time  in  heaven, 
without  anybody's  business  to  meddle  in  only  dont  you 
ever  let  me  catch  you  at  it  I  says,  I  close  my  eyes  to  it  be- 
cause of  your  grandmother,  but  just  you  let  me  catch  you 
doing  it  one  time  on  this  place,  where  my  mother  lives. 
These  damn  little  slick  haired  squirts,  thinking  they  are 
raising  so  much  hell,  I'll  show  them  something  about  hell 
I  says,  and  you  too.  Ill  make  him  think  that  damn  red 


THE     SOUXD     A"S7D     THE     PITHY 

tie  Is  the  latch  string  to  hell,  if  he  thinks  lie  can  run  the 
woods  with  my  niece. 

With  the  sun  and  all  in  my  eyes  and  my  blood  going 
so  I  kept  thinking  every  time  my  head  would  go  on  and 
burst  and  get  it  over  with,  with  briers  and  things  grab- 
bing at  me,  then  I  came  onto  the  sand  ditch  where  they 
had  been  and  I  recognised  the  tree  where  the  car  was, 
and  just  as  I  got  out  of  the  ditch  and  started  running  I 
heard  the  car  start.  It  went  off  fast,  blowing  the  horn. 
They  kept  on  blowing  it,  like  it  was  saying  Yah.  Yah. 
Yaaahhiihhhhh,  going  out  of  sight.  I  got  to  the  road  just 
in  time  to  see  it  go  out  of  sight. 

By  the  time  I  got  up  to  where  my  car  was,  they  were 
clean  out  of  sight,  the  horn  still  blowing.  Well,  I  never 
thought  anything  about  it  except  I  was  saying  Run.  Run 
back  to  town.  Run  home  and  try  to  convince  Mother 
that  I  never  saw  you  in  that  car.  Try  to  make  her  believe 
that  I  dont  know  who  he  was.  Try  to  make  her  believe 
that  I  didn't  miss  ten  feet  of  catching  you  in  that  ditch. 
Try  to  make  her  believe  you  were  standing  up,  too. 

It  kept  on  saying  Yahhhhh,  Yahhhhh,  Yaaahhhhhhhhh, 
getting  fainter  and  fainter.  Then  it  quit,  and  I  could  hear 
a  cow  lowing  up  at  RusselTs  bam.  And  still  I  never 
thought.  I  went  up  to  the  door  and  opened  it  and  raised 
my  foot.  I  kind  of  thought  then  that  the  car  was  leaning 
a  little  more  than  the  slant  of  the  road  would  be,  but  I 
never  found  it  out  until  I  got  in  and  started  off. 

Weil,  I  just  sat  there.  It  was  getting  on  toward  sun- 
down, and  town  was  about  five  miles.  They  never  even 
had  guts  enough  to  puncture  it,  to  jab  a  hole  in  it.  They 
just  let  the  air  out.  I  just  stood  there  for  a  while,  thinking 
about  that  kitchen  full  of  niggers  and  not  one  of  them 
had  time  to  lift  a  tire  onto  the  rack  and  screw  up  a 
couple  of  bolts.  It  was  kmd  of  funny  because  even  she 


SOUND     AND     THE     FURY 

couldn't  ha*  e  seen  far  enough  ahead  to  take  the  pump 
out  on  purpose,  unless  she  thought  about  it  while  he  was 
letting  out  the  air  maybe.  But  what  it  probably  was,  was 
somebody  took  it  out  and  gave  it  to  Ben  to  play  with 
for  a  squirt  gun  because  they'd  take  the  whole  car  to 
pieces  if  he  wanted  It  and  Dilsey  says,  Aint  nobody 
teched  yo  car.  What  we  want  to  fool  with  hit  fer?  and  1 
says  You're  a  nigger.  You're  lucky,  do  you  know  it?  I  says 
I'll  swap  with  you  any  day  because  it  takes  a  white  man 
not  to  have  anymore  sense  than  to  worry  about  what  a 
little  slut  of  a  girl  does. 

I  walked  up  to  Russell's.  He  had  a  pump.  That  was 
just  an  oversight  on  their  part,  I  reckon.  Only  I  still 
couldn't  believe  she'd  have  had  the  nerve  to.  I  kept 
thinking  that.  I  dont  know  why  it  is  I  cant  seem  to  learn 
that  a  woman'll  do  anything.  I  kept  thinking,  Let's  forget 
for  awhile  how  I  feel  toward  you  and  how  you  feel  to- 
ward me:  I  just  wouldn't  do  you  this  way.  I  wouldn't  do 
you  this  way  no  matter  what  you  had  done  to  me.  Be- 
cause like  I  say  blood  is  blood  and  you  cant  get  around 
it.  It's  not  playing  a  joke  that  any  eight  year  old  boy 
could  have  thought  of,  it's  letting  your  own  'ancle  be 
laughed  at  by  a  man  that  would  wear  a  red  tie.  They 
come  into  town  and  call  us  all  a  bunch  of  hicks  and  think 
it's  too  small  to  hold  them.  Well  he  doesn't  know  just 
how  right  he  is.  And  her  too.  If  that's  the  way  she  feels 
about  it,  she'd  better  keep  right  on  going  and  a  damn 
good  riddance. 

I  stopped  and  returned  Russell's  pump  and  drove  on 
to  town.  I  went  to  the  drugstore  and  got  a  coca-cola  and 
then  I  went  to  the  telegraph  office.  It  had  closed  at 
12.21,  forty  points  down.  Forty  times  five  dollars;  buy 
something  with  that  if  you  can,  and  shell  say,  I've  got  to 
have  it  I've  just  got  to  and  I'll  say  that's  too  bad  you'll 


THE     SOUND     AXD     THE     FUBY        261 

have  to  try  somebody  else,  I  haven't  got  any  money;  IVe 
been  too  busy  to  make  any. 

I  just  looked  at  him. 

Til  tell  you  some  news/'  I  says,  "You'll  be  astonished 
to  learn  that  I  am  interested  in  the  cotton  market/*  I  says* 
*That  never  occurred  to  you,  did  it?" 

"I  did  my  best  to  deliver  it/*  he  says.  "I  tried  the  store 
twice  and  called  up  your  house,  but  they  didn't  know 
where  you  were/'  he  says,  digging  in  the  drawer. 

"Deliver  what?"  I  says.  He  handed  me  a  telegram, 
"What  time  did  this  come?"  I  says. 

"About  half  past  three/'  he  says. 

"And  now  it's  ten  minutes  past  five/*  I  says. 

"I  tried  to  deliver  it/'  he  says.  "I  couldn't  End  you." 

"That's  not  my  fault,  is  it?"  I  says.  I  opened  it,  just  to 
see  what  kind  of  a  lie  they'd  tell  me  this  time.  They  must 
be  in  one  hell  of  a  shape  if  they've  got  to  come  all  the 
way  to  Mississippi  to  steal  ten  dollars  a  month.  Sell,  it 
says.  The  market  will  be  unstable,  with  a  general  down- 
ward tendency.  Do  not  be  alarmed  following  govern- 
ment report. 

"How  much  would  a  message  like  this  cost?"  I  says.  He 
told  me. 

"They  paid  it,"  he  says. 

"Then  I  owe  them  that  much,"  I  says.  "I  already  kne11* 
this.  Send  this  collect/'  I  says,  taking  a  blank.  Buy,  : 
wrote,  Market  just  on  point  of  blowing  its  head  off.  Oc- 
casional flurries  for  purpose  of  hooking  a  few  more  coun- 
try suckers  who  haven't  got  in  to  the  telegraph  office  yet. 
Do  not  be  alarmed.  "Send  that  collect,"  I  says. 

He  looked  at  the  message,  then  he  looked  at  the  el; 
"Market  closed  an  hour  ago,"  he  says. 

"Well,"  I  says,  "That's  not  ray  fr-V  -. J^i  :.  dKii  t  in* 
vent  it;  I  just  bought  a  little  of  it  vrMie  unuei  the  impres' 


THE     SOXJXD     AND     THE 

sion  that  the  telegraph  company  would  keep  me  in- 
formed as  to  what  it  was  doing." 

"A  report  is  posted  whenever  it  comes  in/'  he  says. 

"Yes"  I  says,  "And  in  Memphis  they  have  it  on  a  black- 
board every  ten  seconds,"  I  says.  "I  was  within  sixty- 
seven  miles  of  there  once  this  afternoon/' 

He  looked  at  the  message.  "You  want  to  send  this?"  he 
says. 

"I  still  haven't  changed  my  mind,"  I  says.  I  wrote  the 
other  one  out  and  counted  the  money.  "And  this  one  too, 
if  you're  sure  you  can  spell  b-u-y." 

I  went  back  to  the  store.  I  could  hear  the  band  from 
down  the  street  Prohibition's  a  fine  thing.  Used  to  be 
they'd  come  in  Saturday  with  just  one  pair  of  shoes  in 
the  family  and  him  wearing  them,  and  they'd  go  down 
to  the  express  office  and  get  his  package;  now  they  all  go 
to  the  show  barefooted,  with  the  merchants  in  the  door 
like  a  row  of  tigers  or  something  in  a  cage,  watching 
them  pass.  Earl  says, 

"I  hope  it  wasn't  anything  serious." 

"What?"  I  says.  He  looked  at  his  watch.  Then  he  went 
to  the  door  and  looked  at  the  courthouse  clock.  "You 
ought  to  have  a  dollar  watch,"  I  says.  "It  wont  cost  you 
so  much  to  believe  it's  lying  each  time.** 

"What?"  he  says. 

"Nothing,"  I  says.  "Hope  I  haven't  inconvenienced 
you." 

"We  were  not  busy  much,"  he  says.  'They  all  went  to 
the  show.  It's  all  right." 

"If  it's  not  all  right,"  I  says,  "You  know  what  you  can 
do  about  it." 

"I  said  it  was  all  right,"  he  says. 

"I  heard  you/'  I  says.  "And  if  it's  not  all  right,  you 
know  what  you  can  do  about  it." 


THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FUEY 

"Do  you  want  to  quit?"  he  says, 

"It's  not  my  business/*  I  says.  "My  wishes  dont  matter, 
But  dont  get  the  idea  that  you  are  protecting  me  by 
keeping  me." 

"You'd  be  a  good  business  man  if  you'd  let  yourself, 
Jason,'*  he  says. 

"At  least  I  can  tend  to  my  own  business  and  let  other 
peoples'  alone/'  I  says. 

"I  dont  know  why  you  are  trying  to  make  me  fire  you," 
he  says.  "You  know  you  could  quit  anytime  and  there 
wouldn't  be  any  hard  feelings  between  us." 

"Maybe  that's  why  I  dont  quit,"  I  says.  "As  long  as  I 
tend  to  my  job,  that's  what  you  are  paying  me  for/7  I 
went  on  to  the  back  and  got  a  drink  of  water  and  went 
on  out  to  the  back  door.  Job  had  the  cultivators  all  set 
up  at  last.  It  was  quiet  there,  and  pretty  soon  my  head 
got  a  little  easier.  I  could  hear  them  singing  now,  and 
then  the  band  played  again.  Well,  let  them  get  every 
quarter  and  dime  in  the  county;  it  was  no  skin  off  my 
back.  I've  done  what  I  could;  a  man  that  can  live  as  long 
as  I  have  and  not  know  when  to  quit  is  a  fool.  Especially 
as  it's  no  business  of  mine.  If  it  was  my  own  daughter 
now  it  would  be  different,  because  she  wouldn't  have 
time  to;  she'd  have  to  work  some  to  feed  a  few  invalids 
and  idiots  and  niggers,  because  how  could  I  have  the 
face  to  bring  anybody  there.  I've  too  much  respect  for 
anybody  to  do  that.  I'm  a  man,  I  can  stand  it,  it's  my 
own  flesh  and  blood  and  I'd  like  to  see  the  colour  of  the 
man's  eyes  that  would  speak  disrespectful  of  any  woman 
that  was  my  friend  it's  these  damn  good  women  that  do 
it  I'd  like  to  see  the  good,  church-going  woman  that's 
half  as  square  as  Lorraine,  whore  or  no  whore.  Like  I 
say  if  I  was  to  get  married  you'd  go  up  like  a  balloon  and 
you  know  it  and  she  says  I  want  you  to  be  happy  to  have 


264        THE     SOUND     AND     THE 

a  family  of  your  own  not  to  slave  your  life  away  for  us. 
But  111  be  gone  soon  and  then  you  can  take  a  wife  but 
you'll  never  find  a  woman  who  is  worthy  of  you  and  I 
says  yes  I  could.  You'd  get  right  up  out  of  your  grave 
you  know  you  would.  I  says  no  thank  you  I  have  all  the 
women  I  can  take  care  of  now  if  I  married  a  wife  she'd 
probably  turn  out  to  be  a  hophead  or  something.  That's 
all  we  lack  in  this  family,  I  says. 

The  sun  was  down  beyond  the  Methodist  church  now, 
and  the  pigeons  were  flying  back  and  forth  around  the 
steeple,  and  when  the  band  stopped  I  could  hear  them 
cooing.  It  hadn't  been  four  months  since  Christmas,  and 
yet  they  were  almost  as  thick  as  ever.  I  reckon  Parson 
Walthall  was  getting  a  belly  full  of  them  now.  You'd 
have  thought  we  were  shooting  people,  with  him  making 
speeches  and  even  holding  onto  a  man's  gun  when  they 
came  over.  Talking  about  peace  on  earth  good  will  to- 
ward all  and  not  a  sparrow  can  fall  to  earth.  But  what 
does  he  care  how  thick  they  get,  he  hasn't  got  anything 
to  do;  what  does  he  care  what  time  it  is.  He  pays  no 
taxes,  he  doesn't  have  to  see  his  money  going  every  year 
to  have  the  courthouse  clock  cleaned  to  where  it'll  run. 
They  had  to  pay  a  man  forty-five  dollars  to  clean  it.  I 
counted  over  a  hundred  half-hatched  pigeons  on  the 
ground.  You'd  think  they'd  have  sense  enough  to  leave 
town.  It's  a  good  thing  I  dont  have  any  more  ties  than  a 
pigeon,  I'll  say  that. 

The  band  was  playing  again,  a  loud  fast  tune,  like  they 
were  breaking  up.  I  reckon  they'd  be  satisfied  now. 
Maybe  they'd  have  enough  music  to  entertain  them  while 
they  drove  fourteen  or  fifteen  miles  home  and  unhar- 
nessed in  the  dark  and  fed  the  stock  and  milked.  All 
they'd  have  to  do  would  be  to  whistle  the  music  and  tell 


SOUND     AND     THE      FURY         2.65 

the  jokes  to  the  live  stock  in  the  bam,  and  then  they 
coulci  count  up  how  much  they'd  made  by  not  taking 
the  stock  to  the  show  too.  They  could  figure  that  if  a 
man  had  five  children  and  seven  mules,  he  cleared  a 
quarter  by  taking  his  family  to  the  show.  Just  like  that. 
Earl  came  back  with  a  couple  of  packages. 

"Here's  some  more  stuff  going  out/'  he  says.  "Where's 
Uncle  Job?" 

"Gone  to  the  show,  I  imagine,"  I  says.  "Unless  yon 
watched  him." 

"He  doesn't  slip  off/*  he  says.  "I  can  depend  on  him."" 

"Meaning  me  by  that/'  I  says. 

He  went  to  the  door  and  looked  out,  listening. 

"That's  a  good  band/'  he  says.  "It's  about  time  they 
were  breaking  up,  I'd  say." 

"Unless  they're  going  to  spend  the  night  there,'"  I  says. 
The  swallows  had  begun,  and  I  could  hear  the  sparrows 
beginning  to  swarm  in  the  trees  in  the  courthouse  yard. 
Every  once  in  a  while  a  bunch  of  them  would  come 
swirling  around  in  sight  above  the  roof,  then  go  away. 
They  are  as  big  a  nuisance  as  the  pigeons,  to  my  notion. 
You  cant  even  sit  in  the  courthouse  yard  for  them.  First 
thing  you  know,  bing.  Bight  on  your  hat.  But  it  would 
take  a  millionaire  to  afford  to  shoot  them  at  five  cents  a 
shot.  If  they'd  just  put  a  little  poison  out  there  in  the 
square,  they'd  get  rid  of  them  in  a  day,  because  if  a  mer- 
chant cant  keep  his  stock  from  running  around  the 
square,  he'd  better  try  to  deal  in  something  besides 
chickens,  something  that  dont  eat,  like  plows  or  onions. 
And  if  a  man  dont  keep  his  dogs  up,  he  either  dont  want 
it  or  he  hasn't  any  business  with  one.  Like  I  say  if  all  the 
businesses  in  a  town  are  run  like  country  businesses, 
youYe  going  to  have  a  country  town. 


266        THE     SOU2CD     ANB     THE      FURY 

TEt  wont  do  you  any  good  if  they  have  broke  up/*  I 
says.  'They'll  have  to  hitch  up  and  take  out  to  get  home 
by  midnight  as  it  is." 

"Well/'  he  says,  "They  enjoy  it.  Let  them  spend  a  little 
money  on  a  show  now  and  then.  A  hill  farmer  works 
pretty  hard  and  gets  mighty  little  for  it." 

"There's  no  law  making  them  farm  in  the  hills/"  I  says, 
"Or  anywhere  else." 

'Where  would  you  and  me  be,  if  it  wasn't  for  the  fann- 
ers?" he  says. 

'Td  be  home  right  now/'  I  says,  "Lying  down,  with  an 
ice  pack  on  my  head.7* 

"You  have  these  headaches  too  often,''  he  says.  "Why 
dont  you  have  your  teeth  examined  good?  Did  he  go 
over  diem  all  this  morning?" 

"Did  who?"  I  says. 

**You  said  you  went  to  the  dentist  this  morning." 

*Do  you  object  to  my  having  the  headache  on  your 
time?"  I  says.  "Is  that  it?"  They  were  crossing  the  alley 
now,  coming  up  from  the  show. 

"There  they  come/'  he  says.  "I  reckon  I  better  get  up 
front."  He  went  on.  It's  a  curious  thing  how  no  matter 
what's  wrong  with  you,  a  man'll  tell  you  to  have  your 
teeth  examined  and  a  womanll  tell  you  to  get  married, 
It  always  takes  a  man  that  never  made  much  at  any 
thing  to  tell  you  how  to  run  your  business,  though.  Like 
these  college  professors  without  a  whole  pair  of  socks  to 
their  name,  telling  you  how  to  make  a  million  in  ten 
years,  and  a  woman  that  couldn't  even  get  a  husband  can 
always  tell  you  how  to  raise  a  family, 

Old  man  Job  came  up  with  the  wagon.  After  a  while 
he  got  through  wrapping  the  lines  around  the  whip 
socket. 

'Well/'  I  says,  'Was  it  a  good  show?" 


THE      SOUND     AND     THE      FUKY        267 

"I  aint  been  yit/*  he  says.  "But  I  kin  be  arrested  In  dat 
tent  tonight,  dough." 

"Like  hell  you  haven't,"  I  says.  "YouVe  been  away  from 
here  since  three  oclock.  Mr  Earl  was  just  back  here  look- 
ing for  you/' 

"I  been  tendin  to  my  business/*  lie  says.  "Mr  Earl 
knows  whar  I  been/' 

"You  may  can  fool  him/3 1  says.  "I  wont  tell  on  you.** 

"Den  he's  de  onliest  man  here  I'd  try  to  fool/'  he  says. 
"Whut  I  want  to  waste  my  time  f  oolin  a  man  whut  I  dont 
keer  whether  I  sees  him  Sat'dy  night  er  not?  I  wont  try  to 
fool  you/'  he  says.  "You  too  smart  fer  me.  Yes,  suit/'  he 
says,  looking  busy  as  hell,  putting  five  or  six  little  pack- 
ages into  the  wagon,  "You's  too  smart  fer  me.  Aint  a  man 
in  dis  town  kin  keep  up  wid  you  fer  smartness.  You  fools 
a  man  whut  so  smart  he  cant  even  keep  up  wid  hisself/* 
he  says,  getting  in  the  wagon  and  unwrapping  the  reins. 

"Who's  that?"  I  says. 

"Dat's  Mr  Jason  Compson/'  he  says.  "Git  up  dar,  Dan!" 

One  of  the  wheels  was  Just  about  to  come  off*  I 
watched  to  see  if  he'd  get  out  of  the  alley  before  it  did. 
Just  turn  any  vehicle  over  to  a  nigger,  though.  I  says 
that  old  rattletrap's  just  an  eyesore,  yet  youll  keep  it 
standing  there  in  the  carriage  house  a  hundred  years  just 
so  that  boy  can  ride  to  the  cemetery  once  a  week.  I  says 
he's  not  the  first  fellow  that'll  have  to  do  things  he  doesn't 
want  to.  I'd  make  him  ride  in  that  car  like  a  civilised  man 
or  stay  at  home.  What  does  he  know  about  where  he  goes 
or  what  he  goes  in,  and  us  keeping  a  carriage  and  a  horse 
so  he  can  take  a  ride  on  Sunday  afternoon. 

A  lot  Job  cared  whether  the  wheel  came  off  or  not,  long 
as  he  wouldn't  have  too  far  to  walk  back.  Like  I  say  the 
only  place  for  them  is  in  the  field,  where  they'd  have  to 
work  from  sunup  to  sundown.  They  cant  stand  prosper' 


268        THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FIT  BY 

ity  or  an  easy  job.  Let  one  stay  around  white  people  for 
a  while  and  he's  not  worth  killing.  They  get  so  they  can 
outguess  you  about  work  before  your  very  eyes,  like  Ros- 
kus  the  only  mistake  he  ever  made  was  he  got  careless 
one  day  and  died.  Shirking  and  stealing  and  giving  you  a 
little  more  Kp  and  a  little  more  lip  until  some  day  you 
have  to  lay  them  out  with  a  scantling  or  something.  Well, 
it's  Earl's  business.  But  I'd  hate  to  have  my  business  ad- 
vertised over  this  town  by  an  old  doddering  nigger  and 
a  wagon  that  you  thought  every  time  it  turned  a  corner 
it  would  come  all  to  pieces. 

The  sun  was  all  high  up  in  the  air  now,  and  inside  it 
was  beginning  to  get  dark.  I  went  up  front  The  square 
was  empty.  Earl  was  back  closing  the  safe,  and  then  the 
clock  begun  to  strike. 

**You  lock  the  back  door,"  he  says*  I  went  back  and 
locked  it  and  came  back.  "I  suppose  you're  going  to  the 
show  tonight/'  he  says.  "I  gave  you  those  passes  yester- 
day, didn't  W 

"Yes,"  I  said.  "You  want  them  back?" 

"No,  BO,"  lie  says,  "I  just  forgot  whether  I  gave  them  to 
fou  or  not.  No  sense  in  wasting  them." 

He  locked  the  door  and  said  Goodnight  and  went  on. 
fhe  sparrows  were  still  rattling  away  in  the  trees,  but  the 
square  was  empty  except  for  a  few  cars.  There  was  a  ford 
in  front  of  the  drugstore,  but  I  didn't  even  look  at  it.  I 
know  when  I've  had  enough  of  anything.  I  dont  mind 
trying  to  help  her,  but  I  know  when  I've  had  enough.  I 
guess  I  could  teach  Luster  to  drive  it,  then  they  could 
chase  her  all  day  long  if  they  wanted  to,  and  I  could  stay 
home  and  play  with  Ben. 

I  went  in  and  got  a  couple  of  cigars.  Then  I  thought 
I'd  have  another  headache  shot  for  luck,  and  I  stood  and 
talked  with  them  awhile. 


THE     SOU3STB     AND     THE     FURY 

"Well,**  Mac  says,  "I  reckon  yotiVe  got  your  money  on 
the  Yankees  this  year/9 

"What  for?"  I  says. 

"The  Pennant,*5  he  says.  "Not  anything  in  the  League 
can  beat  them/* 

*Uke  hell  there's  not,"  I  says,  They're  shot,"  I  says. 
"You  think  a  team  can  be  that  lucky  forever?" 

1  dant  call  it  luck/*  Mac  says. 

"I  wouldn't  bet  on  any  team  that  fellow  Ruth  played 
on/*  I  says,  "Even  if  I  knew  it  was  going  to  win.** 

"Yes?"  Mac  says. 

"I  can  name  you  a  dozen  men  in  either  League  who're 
more  valuable  than  he  is/*  I  says. 

"What  have  you  got  against  Ruth?"  Mac  says. 

"Nothing/*  I  says.  "I  haven't  got  any  thing  against  him, 
I  dont  even  like  to  look  at  his  picture."  I  went  on  out. 
The  lights  were  coming  on,  and  people  going  along  the 
streets  toward  home.  Sometimes  the  sparrows  never  got 
still  until  full  dark.  The  night  they  turned  on  the  new 
lights  around  the  courthouse  it  waked  them  up  and 
they  were  flying  around  and  blundering  into  the  lights  all 
night  long.  They  kept  it  up  two  or  three  nights,  then 
one  morning  they  were  all  gone.  Then  after  about  two 
months  they  all  came  back  again. 

I  drove  on  home.  There  were  no  lights  in  the  house  yet, 
but  they'd  all  be  looking  out  the  windows,  and  Dilsey 
jawing  away  in  the  kitchen  like  it  was  her  own  food 
she  was  having  to  keep  hot  until  I  got  there.  You'd  think 
to  hear  her  that  there  wasn't  but  one  supper  in  the  world, 
and  that  was  the  one  she  had  to  keep  back  a  few  min- 
utes on  my  account.  Well  at  least  I  could  come  home  one 
time  without  finding  Ben  and  that  nigger  hanging  on 
the  gate  like  a  bear  and  a  monkey  in  the  same  cage.  Just 
let  it  come  toward  sundown  and  he'd  head  for  the  gate 


270        THE     SOUHD     AND     THE     FURY 

like  a  cow  for  tlie  barn,  hanging  onto  it  and  bobbing  his 
head  and  sort  of  moaning  to  himself.  That's  a  hog  for 
punishment  for  you.  If  what  had  happened  to  him  for 
fooling  with  open  gates  had  happened  to  me,  I  never 
would  want  to  see  another  one.  I  often  wondered  what 
he'd  be  thinking  about,  down  there  at  the  gate,  watching 
the  girls  going  home  from  school,  trying  to  want  some- 
thing he  couldn't  even  remember  he  didn't  and  couldn't 
want  any  longer.  And  what  he'd  think  when  they'd  be 
undressing  him  and  he'd  happen  to  take  a  look  at  himself 
and  begin  to  cry  like  he'd  do.  But  like  I  say  they  never 
did  enough  of  that.  I  says  I  know  what  you  need,  you 
need  what  they  did  to  Ben  then  you'd  behave.  And  if 
you  dont  know  what  that  was  I  says,  ask  Dilsey  t<?  teP 
you. 

There  was  a  light  in  Mother's  room.  I  put  the  car  up 
and  went  on  into  the  kitchen.  Luster  and  Ben  were  there. 

^Where's  Dilsey?"  I  says.  TPutting  supper  on?" 

"She  upstairs  wid  Miss  Cahline,"  Luster  says.  "Dey 
been  goin  hit.  Ever  since  Miss  Quentin  come  home. 
Mammy  up  there  keepin  um  fom  fightin.  Is  dat  show 
£ome,  Mr  Jason?" 

"Yes"  I  says. 

"I  thought  I  heard  de  band,"  he  says.  'Wish  I  could 
go,"  he  says.  "I  could  ef  I  jes  had  a  quarter." 

Dilsey  came  in.  *You  come,  is  you?"  she  says.  "Whut 
you  been  up  to  dis  evenin?  You  knows  how  much  work  I 
got  to  do;  whyn't  you  git  here  on  time?" 

"Maybe  I  went  to  the  show,"  1  says.  "Is  supper  ready?" 

"Wish  I  could  go,"  Luster  said.  "I  could  ef  I  jes  had  a 
quarter/' 

"You  aint  got  no  business  at  no  show,"  Dilsey  says. 
"You  go  on  in  de  house  and  set  down,"  she  says.  "Dont 
you  go  up  stairs  and  get  um  started  again,  now." 


THE     SOUISTB     A1STB     THE     FURY 

'What's  the  matter?"  I  says. 

"Qucntin  come  in  a  while  ago  and  says  you  been  fol- 
lerin  her  around  all  evenin  and  den  Miss  CahUne  jumped 
on  her.  Whyn't  you  let  her  alone?  Cant  you  live  in  do 
same  house  wid  you  own  blood  niece  widout  quoiiinf  * 

TL  cant  quarrel  with  her/'  I  says,  "because  I  haven't  seen 
iier  since  this  morning.  What  does  she  say  I*ve  done  now? 
made  her  go  to  school?  That's  pretty  bad/'  I  says, 

"Well,  you  tend  to  yo  business  and  let  her  alone/*  Dil- 
sey  says,  "I'll  take  keer  of  her  e£  you'n  Miss  Cahline'll  let 
me.  Go  on  in  dar  now  and  behave  yoself  twell  I  git  sup- 
per on/* 

"E£  I  jes  had  a  quarter/*  Luster  says,  "I  could  go  to  dat 
show." 

"En  e£  you  had  wings  you  could  fly  to  heaven,"  Dilsey 
says.  "I  dont  want  to  hear  another  word  about  dat  show.*9 

"That  reminds  me/*  I  says,  "I've  got  a  couple  of  ticket? 
they  gave  me/*  I  took  them  out  of  my  coat. 

"You  fixin  to  use  um?"  Luster  says, 

"Not  me/'  I  says.  "I  wouldn't  go  to  it  for  ten  dollars.'* 

"Gimme  one  of  urn,  Mr  Jason/*  he  says. 

"Til  sell  you  one/'  I  says.  "How  about  it?" 

"I  aint  got  no  money/'  he  says. 

"That's  too  bad/'  I  says.  I  made  to  go  out, 

"Gimme  one  of  urn,  Mr  Jason/*  he  says.  'You  aim 
gwine  need  um  bofe." 

"Hush  yo  mouf,"  Dilsey  says,  "Dont  you  know  he  aa 
gwine  give  nothing  away?'* 

"How  much  you  want  f er  hit?**  he  says. 

"Five  cents/'  I  says. 

"I  aint  got  dat  much/*  he  says. 

**How  much  you  got?'*  I  says. 

"1  aint  got  nothing,"  he  says. 

"All  right,"  I  says.  I  went  on. 


THE     SOIJKB     AND     THE     FUB-Y 

"Mr  Jason/'  he  says. 

"Whyn't  you  hush  up?"  Dilsey  says.  "He  jes  teasin 
you.  He  fixin  to  use  dem  tickets  hisself .  Go  on,  Jason,  and 
let  him  lone." 

"I  dont  want  them/*  I  says.  I  came  back  to  the  stove. 
"I  came  in  here  to  burn  them  up.  But  if  you  want  to 
buy  one  for  a  nickel?"  I  says,  looking  at  him  and  open- 
ing  the  stove  lid. 

*'l  aint  got  dat  much/'  he  says. 

"All  right/'  I  says.  I  dropped  one  of  them  in  the  stove. 

"You,  Jason,"  Dilsey  says,  "Aint  you  shamed?" 

"Mr  Jason,5'  he  says,  "Please,  suh.  Ill  fix  dem  tires  ev'ry 
day  fer  a  montV 

"I  need  the  cash/'  I  says.  '"You  can  have  it  for  a  nickel." 

"Hush,  Luster,"  Dilsey  says.  She  jerked  him  back.  "Go 
tm,"  she  says,  "Drop  hit  in.  Go  on.  Git  hit  over  with." 

"You  can  have  it  for  a  nickel,"  I  says. 

"Go  on,"  Dilsey  says.  "He  aint  got  no  nickel.  Go  on. 
Drop  hit  in." 

"All  right/'  I  says.  I  dropped  it  in  and  Dilsey  shut  the 
stove. 

"A  big  growed  man  like  you,"  she  says.  "Git  on  outen 
my  kitchen.  Hush/'  she  says  to  Luster.  "Dont  you  git 
Benjy  started.  I'll  git  you  a  quarter  from  Frony  tonight 
and  you  kin  go  tomorrcv/  night.  Hush  up,  now." 

I  Y/enc  on  into  the  living  room.  I  couldn't  hear  any- 
thing from  upstairs.  I  opened  the  paper.  After  awhile 
Ben  and  Luster  came  in.  Ben  went  to  the  dark  place  on 
the  wall  where  the  mirror  used  to  be,  rubbing  his  hands 
on  it  ana  slobbering  and  moaning.  Luster  begun  punch- 
ing at  the  fire, 

"What're  you  doing?"  I  says.  "We  dont  need  any  fire  to- 
night." 


THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FURY        273 

*!  trying  to  keep  him  quiet/*  lie  says.  "Hit  always  cold 
Easter/*  he  says. 

"Only  this  is  not  Easter,"  I  says.  "Let  it  alone/' 

He  put  the  poker  back  and  got  the  cushion  out  of 
Mother's  chair  and  gave  it  to  Ben,  and  he  hunkered  down 
in  front  of  the  fireplace  and  got  quiet. 

I  read  the  paper.  There  hadn't  been  a  sound  from  up- 
stairs when  Dilsey  came  in  and  sent  Ben  and  Luster  on  to 
the  kitchen  and  said  supper  was  ready. 

"All  right,"  I  says.  She  went  out.  I  sat  there,  reading  the 
paper.  After  a  while  I  heard  Dilsey  looking  in  at  the  door. 

"Whyn't  you  come  on  and  eat?"  she  says. 

"I  m  waiting  for  supper,"  I  says. 

"Hit's  on  the  table,"  she  says.  "I  done  told  you." 

"Is  it?"  I  says.  "Excuse  me.  I  didn't  hear  anybody 
come  down." 

"They  aint  comin,"  she  says.  "You  come  on  and  eat,  so 
I  can  take  something  up  to  them." 

"Are  they  sick?"  I  says.  ""What  did  the  doctor  say  if 
was?  Not  Smallpox,  I  hope." 

"Come  on  here,  Jason,"  she  says,  "So  I  kin  git  done.** 

"All  right,"  I  says,  raising  the  paper  again.  "I'm  waiting 
for  supper  now." 

I  could  feel  her  watching  me  at  the  door.  I  read  the 
paper. 

"Whut  you  want  to  ask  like  this  f er?"  she  says.  "When 
you  knows  how  much  bother  I  has  anyway." 

"If  Mother  is  any  sicker  than  she  was  when  she  came 
down  to  dinner,  all  right,"  I  says.  "But  as  long  as  I  am 
buying  food  for  people  younger  than  I  am,  they'll  have  to 
come  down  to  the  table  to  eat  it.  Let  me  know  when 
supper's  ready,"  I  says,  reading  the  paper  again.  I  heard 
her  climbing  the  stairs,  dragging  her  feet  and  grunting 
and  groaning  like  they  were  straight  up  and  three  fe@f: 


£74        THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FUBY 

*part  I  heard  her  at  Mother's  door,  then  I  heard  her  call- 
tog  Quentin,  like  the  door  was  locked,  then  she  went  back 
to  Mother's  room  and  then  Mother  went  and  talked  to 
Quentin.  Then  they  came  down  stairs.  I  read  the  paper. 

Dilsey  came  back  to  the  door.  "Come  on/*  she  says,  "£o 
you  Mn  think  up  some  mo  devilment.  You  just  tryin  yo- 
self  tonight" 

I  went  to  the  diningroom.  Quentin  was  sitting  with  her 
head  bent.  She  had  painted  her  face  again.  Her  nose 
looked  like  a  porcelain  insulator. 

*Tm  glad  you  feel  well  enough  to  come  down,"  I  says 
to  Mother. 

"It's  little  enough  I  can  do  for  you,  to  come  to  the 
lable,"  she  says.  "No  matter  how  I  feel.  I  realise  that 
when  a  man  works  all  day  he  likes  to  be  surrounded  by 
his  family  at  the  supper  table.  I  want  to  please  yoiL  I 
only  wish  you  and  Quentin  got  along  better.  It  would  be 
easier  for  me." 

**We  get  along  all  right,"  I  says.  1  dont  mind  her  stay- 
ing locked  up  in  her  room  all  day  if  she  wants  to.  But  I 
cant  have  all  this  whoop-de-do  and  sulking  at  mealtimes. 
I  know  that's  a  lot  to  ask  her,  but  I'm  that  way  in  my  own 
house.  Your  house,  I  meant  to  say." 

"It's  yours,"  Mother  says,  "You  are  the  head  of  it  now." 

Quentin  hadn't  looked  up.  I  helped  the  plates  and  she 
begun  to  eat. 

"Did  you  get  a  good  piece  of  meat?"  I  says.  Tf  you 
didn't,  I'll  try  to  find  you  a  better  one." 

She  didn't  say  anything. 

<el  say,  did  you  get  a  good  piece  of  meat?"  I  says. 

"What?"  she  says.  "Yes.  It's  all  right " 

"Will  you  have  some  more  rice?"  I  says. 

"No,"  she  says. 

"Better  let  me  give  you  some  more/"  I  says. 


THE     SOUND     AND     THE     PUBY 

rcl  dont  want  any  more,"  she  says. 

"Not  at  all,"  I  says,  "You're  welcomed 

"Is  your  headache  gone?'*  Mother  says. 

"Headache?"  I  says. 

TL  was  afraid  you  were  developing  one/'  she  says. 
<€When  you  came  in  this  afternoon." 

"Oh,"  I  says.  ""No,  it  didn't  show  up.  We  stayed  so  busy 
this  afternoon  I  forgot  about  it." 

"Was  that  why  you  were  late?"  Mother  says.  I  could 
see  Quentin  listening.  I  looked  at  her.  Her  knife  and  fork 
were  still  going,  but  I  caught  her  looking  at  me,  then  she 
looked  at  her  plate  again.  I  says, 

"No.  I  loaned  my  car  to  a  fellow  about  three  o'clock 
and  I  had  to  wait  until  he  got  back  with  it"  I  ate  for  a 
while. 

"Who  was  it?"  Mother  says. 

"It  was  one  of  those  show  men,"  I  says.  "It  seems  h&* 
sister's  husband  was  out  riding  with  some  town  woman. 
and  he  was  chasing  them." 

Quentin  sat  perfectly  still,  chewing. 

"You  ought  not  to  lend  your  car  to  people  like  that/1 
Mother  says.  "You  are  too  generous  with  it.  That's  why  I 
never  call  on  you  for  it  if  I  can  help  it." 

"I  was  beginning  to  think  that  myself,  for  awhile,"  I 
says.  "But  he  got  back,  all  right.  He  says  he  found  what 
he  was  looking  for." 

"Who  was  the  woman?"  Mother  says. 

"I'll  tell  you  later,"  I  says.  "I  dont  like  to  talk  about 
such  things  before  Quentin." 

Quentin  had  quit  eating.  Every  once  in  a  while  she'd 
take  a  drink  of  water,  then  she'd  sit  there  crumbling  a 
biscuit  up,  her  face  bent  over  her  plate. 

"Yes,"  Mother  says,  "I  suppose  women  who  stay  shut 
HJ>  like  I  do  have  no  idea  what  goes  on  in  this  town." 


THE     SOUKD     AND     THE     FXJUY 

"Yes,"  I  says,  "They  dent." 

"My  life  lias  been  so  different  from  that,"  Mother  says. 
*Thank  God  I  dont  know  about  such  wickedness.  I  dont 
even  want  to  know  about  it.  Fm  not  like  most  people." 

I  didn't  say  any  more.  Quentin  sat  there,  crumbling  the 
biscuit  until  I  quit  eating,  then  she  says, 

"Can  I  go  now?**  without  looking  at  anybody. 

**What?^  I  says.  "Sure,  you  can  go.  Were  you  waiting 
on  usF* 

She  looked  at  me.  She  had  crumbled  all  the  biscuit, 
but  her  hands  still  went  on  like  they  were  crumbling  it 
yet  and  her  eyes  looked  like  they  were  cornered  or  some- 
thing and  then  she  started  biting  her  mouth  like  it  ought 
to  have  poisoned  her,  with  all  that  red  lead. 

"Grandmother/*  she  says,  "Grandmother — " 

"Did  you  want  something  else  to  eat?"  I  says, 

"Why  does  he  treat  me  like  this,  Grandmother?3'"  she 
says.  "I  never  hurt  him/* 

"I  want  you  all  to  get  along  with  one  another,"  Mother 
aays,  "You  are  all  that's  left  now,  and  I  do  want  you  all 
to  get  along  better/' 

It's  his  fault,"  she  says,  *He  wont  let  me  alone,  and  I 
have  to.  If  he  doesn't  want  me  here,  why  wont  he  let 
me  go  back  to—" 

"That's  enough,"  I  says,  "Not  another  word," 

"Then  why  wont  he  let  me  alone?"  she  says.  "He — he 
just — " 

"He  is  the  nearest  thing  to  a  father  you've  ever  had/* 
Mother  says.  "It's  his  bread  you  and  I  eat.  It's  only  right 
that  he  should  expect  obedience  from  you." 

Tt's  his  fault,**  she  says.  She  jumped  up.  "He  makes  me 
do  it  If  he  would  just—"  she  looked  at  us,  her  eyes  cor* 
nered,  kind  of  jerking  her  arms  against  her  sides. 

*Tf  I  would  just  what?"  I  says. 


THE     SOUXB     AND     THE     PtTRY 

'Whatever  I  do,  if s  your  fault,"  she  says.  "If  I'm  bad, 
it's  because  I  had  to  be.  You  made  me.  I  wish  I  was  dead. 
I  wish  we  were  all  dead/*  Then  she  ran.  We  heard  her 
run  up  the  stairs.  Then  a  door  slammed. 

'That's  the  first  sensible  thing  she  ever  said,"  I  says, 

"She  didn't  go  to  school  today/'  Mother  says. 

"How  do  you  know?"  I  says.  "Were  you  down  town?** 

"I  just  know/"  she  says.  "I  wish  you  could  be  kinder  to 
her/' 

"If  I  did  that  I'd  have  to  arrange  to  see  her  more  than 
once  a  day/'  I  says.  "Youll  have  to  make  her  come  to  the 
table  every  meal.  Then  I  could  give  her  an  extra  piece  of 
meat  every  time/' 

There  are  little  things  you  could  do,"  she  says. 

"Like  not  paying  any  attention  when  you  ask  me  to  see 
that  she  goes  to  school?"  I  says. 

"She  didn't  go  to  school  today/*  she  says.  "I  just  know 
she  didn't.  She  says  she  went  for  a  car  ride  with  one  of 
the  boys  this  afternoon  and  you  followed  her/* 

"How  could  I/*  I  says,  "When  somebody  had  my  cat 
all  afternoon?  Whether  or  not  she  was  in  school  today  Is 
already  past/'  I  says,  "If  you've  got  to  worry  about  it, 
worry  about  next  Monday." 

"I  wanted  you  and  she  to  get  along  with  one  another,*5 
she  says.  "But  she  has  inherited  all  of  the  headstrong 
traits.  Quentin's  too.  I  thought  at  the  time,  with  the  herit- 
age she  would  already  have,  to  give  her  that  name,  too. 
Sometimes  I  think  she  is  the  judgment  of  Caddy  and 
Quentin  upon  me/* 

"Good  Lord/*  I  says,  "You've  got  a  fine  mind.  No 
wonder  you  kept  yourself  sick  all  the  time/* 

"What?"  she  says.  "I  dont  understand/' 

"I  hope  not/'  I  says.  "A  good  woman  misses  a  lot  she's 
better  ofE  without  knowing.** 


V*         THE     SOXJXD     AND     THE     FURY 

"They  were  both  that  way/*  she  says,  "They  would 
make  interest  with,  your  father  against  me  when  I  tried 
to  correct  them.  He  was  always  saying  they  didn't  need 
controlling,  that  they  already  knew  what  cleanliness  and 
honesty  were,  which  was  all  that  anyone  could  hope  to 
be  taught.  And  now  I  hope  he's  satisfied.'7 

"You've  got  Ben  to  depend  on,"  I  says,  "Cheer  up  * 

They  deliberately  shut  me  out  of  their  lives/*  she 
says,  "It  was  always  her  and  Quentin.  They  were  always 
conspiring  against  me.  Against  you  too,  though  you 
were  too  young  to  realise  it.  They  always  looked  on  you 
and  me  as  outsiders,  Hke  they  did  your  Uncle  Maury.  I 
always  told  your  father  that  they  were  allowed  too  much 
freedom,  to  be  together  too  much.  When  Quentin  started 
to  school  we  had  to  let  her  go  the  next  year,  so  she  could 
be  with  him.  She  couldn't  bear  for  any  of  you  to  do  any- 
thing she  couldn't-  It  was  vanity  in  her,  vanity  and  false 
pride.  And  then  when  her  troubles  began  I  knew  that 
Quentin  would  feel  that  he  had  to  do  something  just  as 
bad.  But  I  didn't  believe  that  he  would  have  been  so  self- 
ish as  to — I  didn't  dream  that  he — ** 

""Maybe  he  knew  it  was  going  to  be  a  girl/*  I  says, 
"And  that  one  more  of  them  would  be  more  than  'he 
could  stand." 

"He  could  have  controlled  her/*  she  says.  "He  seemed 
to  be  the  only  person  she  had  any  consideration  for.  But 
that  is  a  part  of  the  judgment  too,  I  suppose/' 

*Yes/?  I  says,  "Too  bad  it  wasn't  me  instead  of  him. 
You'd  be  a  lot  better  off/* 

'Ton  say  things  like  that  to  hurt  me/*  she  says.  "I  de- 
serve it  though.  When  they  began  to  sell  the  land  to  send 
Quentin  to  Harvard  I  told  your  father  that  he  must  make 
an  equal  provision  for  you.  Then  when  Herbert  offered 
to  take  you  into  the  bank  I  said,  Jason  is  provided  for 


THE     SOUND     AXD     THE     TUBY 

now,  and  when  all  the  expense  began  to  pile  up  and  I 
was  forced  to  sell  our  furniture  and  the  rest  of  the  pas- 
ture, I  wrote  her  at  once  because  I  said  she  will  realise 
that  she  and  Quentin  have  had  their  share  and  part  of 
Jason's  too  and  that  it  depends  on  her  now  to  compensate 
him.  I  said  she  will  do  that  out  of  respect  f or  her  father. 
I  believed  that,  then.  But  I'm  just  a  poor  old  woman;  I 
was  raised  to  believe  that  people  would  deny  themselves 
for  their  own  flesh  and  blood.  It's  my  fault  You  were 
right  to  reproach  me.3* 

"Do  you  think  I  need  any  man's  help  to  stand  oa  my 
feet?"  I  says,  "Let  alone  a  woman  that  cant  name  the 
father  of  her  own  child." 

"Jason/*  she  says. 

"All  right,3*  I  says.  "I  didn't  mean  that.  Of  course  not/1 

"If  I  believed  that  were  possible,  after  all  my  suffering." 

"Of  course  it's  not,"  I  says.  "I  didn't  mean  it." 

"I  hope  that  at  least  is  spared  me,"  she  says. 

"Sure  it  is/'  I  says,  "She's  too  much  like  both  of  them 
to  doubt  that." 

"I   couldn't  bear  that/'   she   says. 

"Then  quit  thinking  about  it,"  I  says.  "Has  she  been 
worrying  you  any  more  about  getting  out  at  night?" 

"No.  I  made  her  realise  that  it  was  for  her  own  good 
and  that  she'd  thank  me  for  it  some  day.  She  takes  her 
books  with  her  and  studies  after  I  lock  the  door.  I  see 
the  light  on  as  late  as  eleven  oclock  some  nights." 

"How  do  you  know  she's  studying?**  I  says. 

"I  don't  know  what  else  she'd  do  in  there  alone/'  she 
says.  "She  never  did  read  any." 

"No,"  I  says,  "You  wouldn't  know.  And  you  can  thank 
your  stars  for  that/'  I  says.  Only  what  would  be  the  use 
in  saying  it  aloud.  It  would  just  have  her  crying  on  m@ 
again. 


THE    SOUND    AND    THE    FURY 

I  heard  her  go  up  stairs.  Then  she  called  Quentin  and 
Quentin  says  What?  through  the  door.  "Goodnight/9 
Mother  says.  Then  I  heard  the  key  in  the  lock,  and 
Mother  went  back  to  her  room. 

When  I  finished  my  cigar  and  went  up,  the  light  was 
ftill  on.  I  could  see  the  empty  keyhole,  but  I  couldn't 
hear  a  sound.  She  studied  quiet.  Maybe  she  learned  that 
in  school.  I  told  Mother  goodnight  and  went  on  to  my 
room  and  got  the  box  out  and  counted  it  again.  I  could 
hear  the  Great  American  Gelding  snoring  away  like  a 
planing  mill.  I  read  somewhere  they'd  fix  men  that  way 
to  give  them  women's  voices.  But  maybe  he  didn't  know 
what  they'd  done  to  him.  I  dont  reckon  he  even  knew 
what  he  had  been  trying  to  do,  or  why  Mr  Burgess 
knocked  him  out  with  the  fence  picket.  And  if  they'd 
Just  sent  him  on  to  Jackson  while  he  was  under  the  ether, 
he'd  never  have  known  the  difference.  But  that  would 
have  been  too  simple  for  a  Compson  to  think  of.  Not 
half  complex  enough.  Having  to  wait  to  do  it  at  all 
until  he  broke  out  and  tried  to  run  a  little  girl  down  on 
the  street  with  her  own  father  looking  at  him.  Well,  like 
1  say  they  never  started  soon  enough  with  their  cutting, 
and  they  quit  too  quick.  I  know  at  least  two  more  that 
needed  something  like  that,  and  one  of  them  not  over  a 
mile  away,  either.  But  then  I  dont  reckon  even  that 
would  do  any  good.  Like  I  say  once  a  bitch  always  a 
bitch.  And  just  let  me  have  twenty-four  hours  without 
any  damn  New  York  jew  to  advise  me  what  it's  going  to 
do.  i  dont  want  to  make  a  killing;  save  that  to  suck  in 
the  smart  gamblers  with.  I  just  want  an  even  chance  to 
get  my  money  back.  And  once  I've  done  that  they  can 
bring  all  Beale  Street  and  all  bedlam  in  here  and  two  of 
them  can  sleep  in  my  bed  and  another  one  can  have  my 
place  at  the  table  too. 


APRIL 

8 

1928 


THE  BAY  DAWKED  BLEAK  AND  CHHJU  A  MOVING  WAI& 
of  grey  light  out  of  the  northeast  which,  instead  of 
dissolving  into  moisture,  seemed  to  disintegrate  into  mi* 
nute  and  venomous  particles,  like  dust  that,  when  Dilsey 
opened  the  door  of  the  cabin  and  emerged,  needled  lat* 
erally  into  her  flesh,  precipitating  not  so  much  a  moisture 
as  a  substance  partaking  of  the  quality  of  thin,  not  quite 
congealed  oil.  She  wore  a  stiff  black  straw  hat  perched 
upon  her  turban,  and  a  maroon  velvet  cape  with  a  bor- 
der of  mangy  and  anonymous  fur  above  a  dress  of 
purple  silk,  and  she  stood  in  the  door  for  awhile  with  her 
myriad  and  sunken  face  lifted  to  the  weather,  and  one 
gaunt  hand  flac-soled  as  the  belly  of  a  fish,  then  she 
moved  the  cape  aside  and  examined  the  bosom  of  her 
gown. 

The  gown  fell  gauntly  from  her  shoulders,  across  her 
fallen  breasts,  then  tightened  upon  her  paunch  and  fell 
again,  ballooning  a  little  above  the  nether  garments 
which  she  would  remove  layer  by  layer  as  the  spring  ac* 
complisheri  and  the  warm  days,  in  colour  regal  and  mon* 


THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FUBY 

bund.  She  had  been  a  big  woman  once  but  now  her 
skeleton  rose,  draped  loosely  in  unpadded  skin  that  tight- 
ened again  upon  a  paunch  almost  dropsical,  as  though 
muscle  and  tissue  had  been  courage  or  fortitude  which 
the  days  or  the  years  had  consumed  until  only  the  in- 
domitable skeleton  was  left  rising  like  a  ruin  or  a  land- 
mark above  the  somnolent  and  impervious  guts,  and 
above  that  the  collapsed  face  that  gave  the  impression  of 
the  bones  themselves  being  outside  the  flesh,  lifted  into 
the  driving  day  with  an  expression  at  once  fatalistic  and 
of  a  child's  astonished  disappointment,  until  she  turned 
and  entered  the  house  again  and  closed  the  door. 

The  earth  immediately  about  the  door  was  bare.  It  had 
a  patina,  as  though  from  the  soles  of  bare  feet  in  genera- 
tions, like  old  silver  or  the  walls  of  Mexican  houses  which 
have  been  plastered  by  hand.  Beside  the  house,  shading 
it  in  summer,  stood  three  mulberry  trees,  the  fledged 
leaves  that  would  later  be  broad  and  placid  as  the  palms 
of  hands  streaming  flatly  undulant  upon  the  driving  air. 
A  pair  of  jaybirds  came  up  from  nowhere,  whirled  up  on 
the  blast  like  gaudy  scraps  of  cloth  or  paper  and  lodged 
in  the  mulberries,  where  they  swung  in  raucous  tilt  and 
recover,  screaming  into  the  wind  that  ripped  their  harsh 
cries  onward  and  away  like  scraps  of  paper  or  of  cloth  in 
turn.  Then  three  more  joined  them  and  they  swung  and 
tilted  in  the  wrung  branches  for  a  time,  screaming.  The 
door  of  the  cabin  opened  and  Dilsey  emerged  once  more, 
this  time  in  a  man's  felt  hat  and  an  army  overcoat,  be- 
aeath  the  frayed  skirts  of  which  her  blue  gingham  dress 
fell  in  uneven  balloonings,  streaming  too  about  her  as  she 
crossed  the  yard  and  mounted  the  steps  to  the  kitchen 
door. 

A  moment  later  she  emerged,  carrying  an  open  um- 
brella now,  which  she  slanted  ahead  into  the  wind,  and 


TH:E    SOUND    AND    THE    FURY 

crossed  to  the  woodpile  and  laid  the  umbrella  down, 
still  open.  Immediately  she  caught  at  it  and  arrested  it 
and  held  to  it  for  a  while,  looking  about  her.  Then  she 
closed  it  and  laid  it  down  and  stacked  stovewood  into 
her  crooked  arm,  against  her  breast,  and  picked  up  the 
umbrella  and  got  it  open  at  last  and  returned  to  the  steps 
and  held  the  wood  precariously  balanced  while  she  con- 
trived to  close  the  umbrella,  which  she  propped  in  the 
corner  just  within  the  door.  She  dumped  the  wood  into 
the  box  behind  the  stove.  Then  she  removed  the  overcoat 
and  hat  and  took  a  soiled  apron  down  from  the  wall 
and  put  it  on  and  built  a  fire  in  the  stove*  While  she  was 
doing  so,  rattling  the  grate  bars  and  clattering  the  lids, 
Mrs  Compson  began  to  call  her  from  the  head  of  the 
stairs. 

She  wore  a  dressing  gown  of  quilted  black  satin,  hold' 
ing  it  close  under  her  chin.  In  the  other  hand  she  held  a 
red  rubber  hot  water  bottle  and  she  stood  at  the  head  oi 
the  back  stairway,  calling  "Dilsey"  at  steady  and  inflec- 
tionless  intervals  into  the  quiet  stairwell  that  descended 
into  complete  darkness,  then  opened  again  where  a  grey 
window  fell  across  it.  TDilsey,"  she  called,  without  inflec- 
tion or  emphasis  or  haste,  as  though  she  were  not  listen 
ing  for  a  reply  at  all.  "Dilsey." 

Dilsey  answered  and  ceased  clattering  the  stove,  but 
before  she  could  cross  the  kitchen  Mrs  Compson  called 
her  again,  and  before  she  crossed  the  diningroom  and 
brought  her  head  into  relief  against  the  grey  splash  of 
the  window,  still  again. 

"All  right,"  Dilsey  said,  "All  right,  here  I  is.  IT]  fill  hit 
soon  ez  I  git  some  hot  water."  She  gathered  up  her  skirts 
and  mounted  the  stairs,  wholly  blotting  the  grey  light. 
"Put  hit  dbwn  dar  en  g'awn  back  to  bed." 

"I  couldn't  understand  what  was  the  matter,** 


284        THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FURY 

Compson  said.  *Tve  been  lying  awake  for  an  hour  at 
least,  without  hearing  a  sound  from  the  kitchen/* 

"You  put  hit  down  and  g'awn  back  to  bed/'  Dilsey 
said.  She  toiled  painfully  up  the  steps,  shapeless,  breath- 
ing heavily.  Til  have  de  fire  gwiae  in  a  minute,  en  de 
water  hot  in  two  mo."* 

"I've  been  lying  there  for  an  houry  at  least/*  Mrs  Comp- 
son  said.  *1  thought  maybe  you  were  waiting  for  me  to 
come  down  and  start  the  fire.** 

Dilsey  reached  the  top  of  the  stairs  and  took  the  water 
bottle.  'Til  fix  hit  in  a  minute/*  she  said.  "Luster  overslep 
dis  mawnin,  up  half  de  night  at  dat  show.  I  gwine  build 
Je  fire  myself.  Go  on  now,  so  you  wont  wake  de  others 
twell  I  ready." 

"If  you  permit  Luster  to  do  things  that  interfere  with 
Ms  work,  youH  have  to  suffer  for  it  yourself/'  Mrs  Comp- 
son  said.  "Jason  wont  like  this  if  he  hears  about  it.  You 
know  he  wont/* 

Twusn't  none  of  Jason's  money  he  went  on/*  Dilsey 
said.  "Dafs  one  thing  sho/*  She  went  on  down  the  stairs. 
Mrs  Compson  returned  to  her  room.  As  she  got  into  bed 
again  she  could  hear  Dilsey  yet  descending  the  stairs 
with  a  sort  of  painful  and  terrific  slowness  that  would 
have  become  maddening  had  it  not  presently  ceased  be- 
yond the  flapping  diminishment  of  the  pantry  door. 

She  entered  the  kitchen  and  built  up  the  fire  and  be- 
gan to  prepare  breakfast.  In  the  midst  of  this  she  ceased 
and  went  to  the  window  and  looked  out  toward  her 
cabin,  then  she  went  to  the  door  and  opened  it  and 
shouted  into  the  driving  weather. 

"Luster!"  she  shouted,  standing  to  listen,  tilting  her  face 
from  the  wind,  "You,  Luster?'*  She  listened*  then  as  she 
prepared  to  shout  again  Luster  appeared  around  the 
comer  of  the  kitchen. 


THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FIT  BY 

"Ma'am?"  lie  said  innocently,  so  innocently  that  Dilsey 
looked  down  at  him,  for  a  moment  motionless  with  some- 
thing more  than  mere  surprise. 

"Whar  you  at?"  she  said. 

"Nowhere,"  he  said.  **Jes  ^  de  cellar/' 

"Whut  you  doin  in  de  cellar?''  she  said.  TDont  stand 
dar  in  de  rain,  fool,"  she  said. 

"Aint  doin  nothing  he  said.  He  came  up  the  steps. 

"Dont  you  dare  come  in  dis  do  widout  a  armful  of 
wood/"  she  said.  "Here  I  done  had  to  tote  yo  wood  en 
build  yo  fire  bofe.  Didn't  I  tole  you  not  to  leave  dis 
place  last  night  befo  dat  woodbox  wus  full  to  de  top?8* 

TL  did,"  Luster  said,  "I  filled  hit." 

"Whar  hit  gone  to,  den?" 

"I  dont  know'm.  I  aint  teched  hit." 

'Well,  you  git  hit  full  up  now,"  she  said.  "And  git  OB 
up  den  en  see  bout  Benjy/* 

She  shut  the  door.  Luster  went  to  the  woodpile.  The 
five  jaybirds  whirled  over  the  house,  screaming,  and 
into  the  mulberries  again.  He  watched  them.  He  picked 
up  a  rock  and  threw  it  "Whoo,"  he  said,  "Git  on  back 
to  hell,  whar  you  belong  at.  'Taint  Monday  jit/* 

He  loaded  himself  mountainously  with  stove  wood* 
He  could  not  see  over  it,  and  he  staggered  to  the  steps 
and  up  them  and  blundered  crashing  against  the  door, 
shedding  billets.  Then  Dilsey  came  and  opened  the  door 
for  him  and  he  blundered  across  the  kitchen.  "You,  Lus- 
ter!" she  shouted,  but  he  had  already  hurled  the  wood 
into  the  box  with  a  thunderous  crash.  TThr  he  said. 

"Is  you  tryin  to  wake  up  de  whole  house?"  Dilsey  said. 
She  hit  him  on  the  back  of  his  head  with  the  flat  of  hel 
hand.  "Go  on  up  dar  and  git  Benjy  dressed,  now/' 

"Yessum,"  he  said.  He  went  toward  the  outer  door. 

**Whar  you  gwine?"  Dilsey  said. 


2$6        THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FURY 

"*!  thought  I  better  go  round  de  house  en  in  by  de 
front,  so  I  wont  wake  up  Miss  Cahline  en  dem" 

"Ton  go  on  up  dem  backstairs  like  I  tole  you  en  git 
Benjy's  clothes  on  him/*  Dilsey  said.  "Go  on,  now." 

"Yessum,"  Luster  said.  He  returned  and  left  by  the 
diningrooni  door*  After  awhile  it  ceased  to  flap.  Dilsey 
prepared  to  make  biscuit.  As  she  ground  the  sifter 
.steadily  above  the  bread  board,  she  sang,  to  herself  at 
first,  something  without  particular  tune  or  words,  repeti- 
tive, mournful  and  plaintive,  austere,  as  she  ground  a 
faint,  steady  snowing  of  flour  onto  the  breadboard.  The 
stove  had  begun  to  heat  the  room  and  to  fill  it  with  mur- 
murous minors  of  the  fire,  and  presently  she  was  singing 
louder,  as  if  her  voice  too  had  been  thawed  out  by  the 
growing  warmth,  and  then  Mrs  Compson  called  her 
name  again  from  within  the  house.  Dilsey  raised  her  face 
as  if  her  eyes  could  and  did  penetrate  the  walls  and  ceil- 
ing and  saw  the  old  woman  in  her  quilted  dressing  gown 
at  the  head  of  the  stairs,  calling  her  name  with  machine- 
like  regularity. 

"'Oh,  Lawd,"  Dilsey  said.  She  set  the  sifter  down  and 
swept  up  the  hem  of  her  apron  and  wiped  her  hands 
and  caught  up  the  bottle  from  the  chair  on  which  she 
had  laid  it  and  gathered  her  apron  about  the  handle  of 
the  kettle  which  was  now  jetting  faintly.  "Jes  a  minute," 
she  called,  "De  water  jes  dis  minute  got  hot." 

It  was  not  the  bottle  which  Mrs  Compson  wanted, 
however,  and  clutching  it  by  the  neck  like  a  dead  hen 
Dilsey  went  to  the  foot  of  the  stairs  and  looked  upward. 

"Aint  Luster  up  dar  wid  him?"  she  said. 

"Luster  hasn't  been  in  the  house.  IVe  been  lying  here 
listening  for  him.  I  knew  he  would  be  late,  but  I  did  hope 
jbe'd  come  in  time  to  keep  Benjamin  from  disturbing  Ja- 


THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FtTSY        287 

son  on  Jason's  one  day  in  the  week  to  sleep  in  the  mom* 
'ng- 

"I  dont  see  how  you  expect  anybody  to  sleep,  wid  you 
standin  in  de  hall,  hoIFin  at  folks  fum  de  crack  of 
dawn,"  Dilsey  said.  She  began  to  mount  the  stairs,  toiling 
heavily.  "I  sont  dat  boy  up  dar  half  hour  ago.** 

Mrs  Compson  watched  her,  holding  the  dressing  gown 
under  her  chin.  "What  are  you  going  to  doF*  she  said. 

^Gwine  git  Benjy  dressed  en  bring  him  down  to  de 
kitchen,  whar  he  wont  wake  Jason  en  Quentin/*  Dilsey 
said. 

"Haven't   you   started   breakfast   yet?" 

"Ill  tend  to  dat  too/'  Dilsey  said.  "You  better  git  back 
in  bed  twell  Luster  make  yo  fire.  Hit  cold  dis  mawnin.** 

<;I  know  it/*  Mrs  Compson  said.  "My  feet  are  like  ice. 
They  were  so  cold  they  waked  me  up."  She  watched  Dil- 
sey mount  the  stairs.  It  took  her  a  long  while.  "You  know 
how  it  frets  Jason  when  breakfast  is  late,"  Mrs  Compson 
said. 

"I  cant  do  but  one  thing  at  a  time/'  Dilsey  said.  '"You 
git  on  back  to  bed,  fo  I  has  you  on  my  hands  dis  mawnin 
too." 

"If  you're  going  to  drop  everything  to  dress  Benjamin, 
I'd  better  come  down  and  get  breakfast.  You  know  as 
well  as  I  do  how  Jason  acts  when  it's  late." 

"En  who  gwine  eat  yo  messin?"  Dilsey  said.  "Tell  me 
dat.  Go  on  now/'  she  said,  toiling  upward.  Mrs  Comp- 
son stood  watching  her  as  she  mounted,  steadying  herself 
against  the  wall  with  one  hand,  holding  her  skirts  up 
with  the  other. 

"Are  you  going  to  wake  him  up  just  to  dress  him?"  she 
said. 

Dilsey  stopped.  With  her  fo©t  Mfted  to  the  next  step 


288        THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FUEY 

she  stood  there,  her  hand  against  the  wall  and  the 
splash  of  the  window  behind  her,  motionless  and  shape- 
less she  loomed. 

"He  aint  awake  den?"  she  said. 

"He  wasn't  when  I  looked  in/*  Mrs  Compson  said.  "But 
it's  past  his  time.  He  never  does  sleep  after  naif  past 
seven.  You  know  he  doesn't/' 

Dilsey  said  nothing.  She  made  no  further  move,  but 
though  she  could  not  see  her  save  as  a  blobby  shape 
without  depth,  Mrs  Compson  knew  that  she  had  lowered 
her  face  a  little  and  that  she  stood  now  like  a  cow  in  the 
tain,  as  she  held  the  empty  water  bottle  by  its  neck. 

"You're  not  the  one  who  has  to  bear  it/*  Mrs  Compson 
said.  "It's  not  your  responsibility.  You  can  go  away.  You 
dont  have  to  bear  the  brunt  of  it  day  in  and  day  out. 
You  owe  nothing  to  them,  to  Mr  Compson's  memory.  I 
know  you  have  never  had  any  tenderness  for  Jason. 
You've  never  tried  to  conceal  it." 

Dilsey  said  nothing.  She  turned  slowly  and  descended, 
lowering  her  body  from  Jtep  to  step,  as  a  small  child 
does,  her  hand  against  the  wall.  "You  go  on  and  let  him 
alone/'  she  said.  "Dont  go  in  dar  no  mo,  now.  I'll  send 
Luster  up  soon  as  I  find  him.  Let  him  alone,  now." 

She  returned  to  the  kitchen.  She  looked  into  the  stove, 
then  she  drew  her  apron  over  her  head  and  donned  the 
overcoat  and  opened  the  outer  door  and  looked  up  and 
down  the  yard.  The  weather  drove  upon  her  flesh,  harsh 
and  minute,  but  the  scene  was  empty  of  all  else  that 
moved.  She  descended  the  steps,  gingerly,  as  if  for  si- 
lence, and  went  around  the  corner  of  the  kitchen.  As  she 
did  so  Luster  emerged  quickly  and  innocently  from  the 
cellar  door, 

Dilsey  stopped.  "Whut  you  up  to?*   she  said, 


THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FUEY        289 

"No-thin,"  Luster  said,  "Mr  Jason  say  f  er  me  to  find  out 
what  dat  water  leak  in  de  cellar  fum." 

"En  when  wus  hit  he  say  fer  you  to  do  dat?*  Dilsey 
said,  "last  New  Year's  day,  wasn't  hit?" 

"I  thought  I  jes  be  lookin  whiles  dey  sleep,"  Luster 
said.  Dilsey  went  to  the  cellar  door.  He  stood  aside  and 
she  peered  down  into  the  obscurity  odorous  of  dank 
earth  and  mould  and  rubber, 

"Huh/*  Dilsey  said.  She  looked  at  Luster  again.  He  met 
her  gaze  blandly,  innocent  and  open.  "I  dont  know  whut 
you  up  to,  but  you  aint  got  no  business  doin  hit.  You  jes 
tryin  me  too  dis  mawnin  cause  de  others  is,  aint  you? 
You  git  on  up  dar  en  see  to  Benjy,  you  hear?** 

"Yessuin,"  Luster  said.  He  went  on  toward  the  kitchen 
steps,  swiftly. 

"Here,3*  Dilsey  saids  "You  git  me  another  armful  of 
wood  while  I  got  you." 

"Yessum,"  he  said.  He  passed  her  on  the  steps  and 
went  to  the  woodpile.  When  he  blundered  again  at  the 
door  a  moment  later,  again  invisible  and  blind  within 
and  beyond  his  wooden  avatar,  Dilsey  opened  the  dool 
and  guided  him  across  the  kitchen  with  a  firm  hand. 

"Jes  thow  hit  at  dat  box  again,"  she  said,  "Jes  thow 
hit" 

"I  got  to,"  Luster  said,  panting,  "I  cant  put  hit  down  no 
other  way/" 

"Den  you  stand  dar  en  hold  hit  a  while/'  Dilsey  said* 
She  unloaded  him  a  stick  at  a  time.  "Whut  got  into  you 
dis  mawnin?  Here  I  sont  you  fer  wood  en  you  aint  never 
brought  mo'n  six  sticks  at  a  time  to  save  yo  life  twell  to* 
day.  Whut  you  Bxin  to  ax  me  kin  you  do  now?  Aint  dal 
show  lef  town  yit?" 

^Tessum.  Hit  done  gone,5* 


290        THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FTJBT 

She  put  the  last  stick  into  the  box,  "Now  you  go  on  up 
dar  wid  Benjy,  like  I  tola  you  bef o/*  she  said.  "And  I  dont 
want  nobody  else  yellin  down  dem  stairs  at  me  twefl  I 
rings  de  bell,  You  hear  me/* 

'Tessum/'  Luster  said.  He  vanished  through  the  swing 
door.  Dilsey  put  some  more  wood  in  the  stove  and  re- 
turned to  the  bread  board.  Presently  she  began  to  sing 
again. 

The  room  grew  warmer.  Soon  Dilsey's  skin  had  taken 
on  a  rich,  lustrous  quality  as  compared  with  that  as  of  a 
faint  dusting  of  wood  ashes  which  both  it  and  Luster's 
had  worn,  as  she  moved  about  the  kitchen,  gathering 
about  her  the  raw  materials  of  food,  coordinating  the 
meal.  On  the  wall  above  a  cupboard,  invisible  save  at 
night,  by  lamp  light  and  even  then  evincing  an  enigmatic 
profundity  because  it  had  but  one  hand,  a  cabinet  clock 
ticked,  then  with  a  preliminary  sound  as  if  it  had  cleared 
its  throat,  struck  five  times. 

"Eight  oclock,"  Dilsey  said.  She  ceased  and  tilted  her 
head  upward,  listening.  But  there  was  no  sound  save  the 
clock  and  the  fire.  She  opened  the  oven  and  looked  at  the 
pan  of  bread,  then  stooping  she  paused  while  someone 
descended  the  stairs.  She  heard  the  feet  cross  the  dining- 
room,  then  the  swing  door  opened  and  Luster  entered, 
followed  by  a  big  man  who  appeared  to  have  been 
shaped  of  some  substance  whose  particles  would  not  or 
did  not  cohere  to  one  another  or  to  the  frame  which  sup- 
ported it  His  skin  was  dead  looking  and  hairless;  dropsi- 
cal too,  he  moved  with  a  shambling  gait  like  a  trained 
bear.  His  hair  was  pale  and  fine.  It  had  been  brushed 
smoothly  down  upon  his  brow  like  that  of  children  in 
daguerrotypes.  His  eyes  were  clear,  of  the  pale  sweet  blue 
of  cornflowers,  his  thick  mouth  hung  open,  drooling  a 
little. 


THE     SOUND     AXB     THE     FURY 

"Is  he  cold?"  Dilsey  said.  She  wiped  her  hands  on  her 
apron  and  touched  his  hand. 

"Ef  he  aint,  I  is™  Luster  said.  "Always  cold  Easter.  Aint 
never  seen  hit  fail.  Miss  Caliline  say  ef  you  aint  got  time 
to  fix  her  hot  water  bottle  to  never  mind  about  hit." 

"Oh,  lawd,"  Dilsey  said.  She  drew  a  chair  into  the  cor- 
ner between  the  woodbox  and  the  stove.  The  man  went 
obediently  and  sat  in  it.  "Look  in  de  dinin  room  and  see 
whar  I  laid  dat  bottle  down/7  Dilsey  said.  Luster  fetched 
the  bottle  from  the  diningroom  and  Dilsey  filled  it  and 
gave  it  to  him.  "Hurry  up,  now/*  she  said.  ""See  ef  Jason 
wake  now.  Tell  em  hit's  all  ready." 

Luster  went  out.  Ben  sat  beside  the  stove.  He  sat 
loosely,  utterly  motionless  save  for  his  head,  which  made 
a  continual  bobbing  sort  of  movement  as  he  watched 
Dilsey  with  his  sweet  vague  gaze  as  she  moved  about. 
Luster  returned. 

"He  up/*  he  said,  "Miss  CahUne  say  put  hit  on  de 
table."  He  came  to  the  stove  and  spread  his  hands  palm 
down  above  the  firebox.  "He  up,  too/'  He  said,  **Gwine 
hit  wid  bofe  feet  dis  ma  wain/" 

"Whut's  de  matter  now?"  Dilsey  said.  "Git  away  fum 
dar.  How  kin  I  do  anything  wid  you  standin  over  de 
stove?" 

"I  cold/'  Luster  said. 

"You  ought  to  thought  about  dat  whiles  you  wus  down 
dar  in  dat  cellar/'  Dilsey  said.  "Whut  de  matter  wid 
Jason?" 

"Sayin  me  en  Benjy  broke  dat  winder  in  his  room/' 

"Is  dey  one  broke?'?  Dilsey  said. 

"Dat's  whut  he  savin,"  Luster  said.  "Say  I  broke  hit." 

"How  could  you,  when  he  keep  hit  locked  all  day  en 
night?" 

"Say  I  broke  hit  chunkin  rocks  at  hit/'  Luster  said. 


THE     SOUXB     AXB     T  -J B     FURY 

"En  did  you?" 

"Nome/'   Luster   said. 

**Dont  lie  to  me,  boy,"  Dilsey  said. 

*I  never  done  kit/'  Luster  said.  "Ask  Benjy  ef  I  did.  I 
aint  stud'in  dat  winder/* 

"Who  could  a  broke  hit,  den?"  Dilsey  said.  "He  jes  tryin 
hisself,  to  wake  Quentin  up/*  she  said,  taking  the  pan  of 
biscuits  out  of  the  stove. 

"Reckin  so/'  Luster  said.  TDese  is  funny  folks.  Glad  I 
aint  none  of  em." 

"Aint  none  of  who?**  Dilsey  said.  "Lezmne  tell  you 
somethin,  nigger  boy,  you  got  jes  es  much  Compson  dev- 
ilment in  you  es  any  of  em.  Is  you  right  sho  you  never 
broke  dat  window?" 

*Whut  I  want  to  break  hit  fur?" 

"Whut  you  do  any  of  you  devilment  fur?"  Dilsey  said. 
"Watch  him  now,  so  he  cant  burn  his  hand  again  twell  I 
git  de  table  set." 

She  went  to  the  diningroom,  where  they  heard  her 
moving  about,  then  she  returned  and  set  a  plate  at  the 
kitchen  table  and  set  food  there.  Ben  watched  her,  slob- 
bering, making  a  faint,  eager  sound. 

"All  right,  honey/*  she  said,  "Here  yo  breakfast.  Bring 
his  chair,  Luster/'  Luster  moved  the  chair  up  and  Ben 
sat  down,  whimpering  and  slobbering.  Dilsey  tied  a  cloth 
about  his  neck  and  wiped  his  mouth  with  the  end  of  it 
"And  see  kin  you  kep  fum  messin  up  his  clothes  one 
time/'  she  said,  handing  Luster  a  spoon. 

Ben  ceased  whimpering.  He  watched  the  spoon  as  it 
rose  to  his  mouth.  It  was  as  if  even  eagerness  were  mus- 
cle-bound in  him  too,  and  hunger  itself  inarticulate,  not 
knowing  it  is  hunger.  Luster  fed  him  with  skill  and  de- 
tachment. Now  and  then  his  attention  would  return  long 
enough  to  enable  him  to  feint  the  spoon  and  cause  Ben 


THE     sOUXD     AXB     THE     FURY 

to  close  his  mouth  upon  the  empty  alr5  but  it  was  appar- 
ent that  Luster's  mind  was  elsewhere.  His  other  hand 
lay  on  the  back  of  the  chair  and  upon  that  dead  surface 
It  moved  tentatively.,  delicately,  as  if  he  were  picking  an 
inaudible  tune  out  of  the  dead  void,  and  once  he  even 
forgot  to  tease  Ben  with  the  spoon  while  his 
teased  out  of  the  slain  wood  a  soundless  and  involved 
arpeggio  until  Ben  recalled  Mm  by  whimpering  again. 

In  the  diningroom  Dilsey  moved  back  and  forth.  Pres- 
ently she  rang  a  small  clear  bell,  then  in  the  kitchen  Lus- 
ter heard  Mrs  Compson  and  Jason  descending,  and  Ja- 
son's voice,  and  he  rolled  his  eyes  wMtely  with  listening. 

"Sure,  I  know  they  didn't  break  it,"  Jason  said.  "Surea 
I  know  that.  Maybe  the  change  of  weather  broke  it/* 

<el  dont  see  how  it  could  have/'  Mrs  Compson  said, 
**Your  room  stays  locked  all  day  long,  just  as  you  leave  it 
when  you  go  to  town.  None  of  us  ever  go  in  there  except 
Sunday,  to  clean  it,  I  dont  want  you  to  think  that  I  would 
go  where  I'm  not  wanted,  or  that  I  would  permit  anyone 
else  to." 

"I  never  said  you  broke  it,  did  I?"  Jason  said. 

"I  dont  want  to  go  in  your  room/'  Mrs  Compson  said* 
T  respect  anybody's  private  affairs.  I  wouldn't  put  my 
foot  over  the  threshold,  even  if  I  had  a  key/' 

"Yes,"  Jason  said,  "I  know  your  keys  wont  fit.  That's 
why  I  had  the  lock  changed.  What  I  want  to  know  is, 
how  that  window  got  broken." 

TLuster  say  he  didn't  do  hit/'  Dilsey  said. 

"I  knew  that  without  asking  him/'  Jason  said.  "Where's 
Quentin?"  he  said. 

'Where  she  is  ev'y  Sunday  mawnin/'  Dilsey  said* 
**Whut  got  into  you  de  last  few  days,  anyhow?" 

"Well,  we're  going  to  change  all  that/'  Jason  said.  "Ga 
up  and  tell  her  breakfast  is  ready/' 


THE     SOITHD     AND     THE      FURY 

"You  leave  her  alone  now,  Jason,9*  Dilsey  said.  "She 
gits  up  fer  breakfast  ev'y  week  mawnin,  en  Cahline  lets 
her  stay  in  bed  ev'y  Sunday.  You  knows  dat." 

"I  cant  keep  a  kitchen  full  of  niggers  to  wait  on  her 
pleasure,  much  as  I'd  like  to,"  Jason  said.  "Go  and  tell 
her  to  come  down  to  breakfast/' 

"Aint  nobody  have  to  wait  on  her,"  Dilsey  said,  "I 
puts  her  breakfast  in  de  warmer  en  she — " 

"Did  you  hear  me?"  Jason  said. 

"I  hears  you,"  Dilsey  said.  "All  I  been  hearin,  when  you 
in  de  house.  Ef  hit  aint  Quentin  er  yo  maw,  hit's  Luster 
en  Benjy.  Whut  you  let  him  go  on  dat  way  fer,  Miss 
Cahline?" 

"You'd  better  do  as  he  says/'  Mrs  Compson  said,  "He's 
head  of  the  house  now.  It's  his  right  to  require  us  to  re- 
spect his  wishes.  I  try  to  do  it,  and  if  I  can,  you  can  too." 

Taint  no  sense  in  him  bein  so  bad  tempered  he  got 
to  make  Quentin  git  up  jes  to  suit  him,"  Dilsey  said. 
**Maybe  you  think  she  broke  dat  window." 

"She  would,  if  she  happened  to  think  of  it,"  Jason  said. 
**You  go  and  do  what  I  told  you." 

**En  I  wouldn't  blame  her  none  ef  she  did,"  Dilsey 
said,  going  toward  the  stairs.  "Wid  you  naggin  at  her  all 
de  blessed  time  yo  in  de  house." 

"Hush,  Dilsey,"  Mrs  Compson  said,  "It's  neither  your 
place  nor  mine  to  tell  Jason  what  to  do.  Sometimes  I 
think  he  is  wrong,  but  I  try  to  obey  his  wishes  for  you 
alls'  sakes.  If  I'm  strong  enough  to  come  to  the  table, 
Quentin  can  too." 

Dilsey  went  out  They  heard  her  mounting  the  stairs. 
They  heard  her  a  long  while  on  the  stairs. 

"YouVe  got  a  prize  set  of  servants,"  Jason  said.  He 
helped  his  mother  and  himself  to  food.  "Did  you  ever 
have  one  that  was  worth  killing?  You  must  have  had 
some  before  I  was  big  enough  to  remember." 


THE     SOUXD     AXD     THE     FTJBY 

"I  have  to  humour  them,**  Mrs  Compson  said.  **I  have 
to  depend  on  them  so  completely.  It's  not  as  if  I  were 
strong.  I  wish  I  were.  I  wish  I  could  do  all  the  house 
•work  myself.  I  could  at  least  take  that  much  off  youi 
shoulders." 

"And  a  fine  pigsty  we'd  live  in,  too/*  Jason,  said.  "Hurry 
up,  Dilsey ,"  he  shouted. 

"I  know  you  blame  me/*  Mrs  Compson  said,  "for  let- 
ting them  off  to  go  to  church  today/' 

"Go  where?"  Jason  said.  "Hasn't  that  damn  show  left 
yet?" 

"To  church/'  Mrs  Compson  said.  "The  darkies  are  hav- 
ing a  special  Easter  service.  I  promised  Dilsey  two  weeks 
ago  that  they  could  get  off/* 

"'Which  means  well  eat  cold  dinner/*  Jason  said,  "of 
none  at  all." 

"I  know  it's  my  fault/*  Mrs  Compson  said.  "I  know  you 
blame  me/' 

"For  what?"  Jason  said.  'You  never  resurrected  Christ, 
did  you?" 

They  heard  Dilsey  mount  the  final  stair,  then  her  slo^ 
feet  overhead. 

"Quentin/*  she  said.  When  she  called  the  first  time  Ja- 
son laid  his  knife  and  fork  down  and  he  and  his  mother 
appeared  to  wait  across  the  table  from  one  another,  in 
identical  attitudes;  the  one  cold  and  shrewd,  with  close- 
thatched  brown  hair  curled  into  two  stubborn  hooks,  one 
on  either  side  of  his  forehead  like  a  bartender  in  carica- 
ture, and  hazel  eyes  with  black-ringed  irises  like  marbles^ 
the  other  cold  and  querulous,  with  perfectly  white  hair 
and  eyes  pouched  and  baffled  and  so  dark  as  to  appear 
to  be  aE  pupil  or  all  iris. 

"Quentin,"  Dilsey  saw7,  "Git  up,  honey.  Dey  waitin 
breakfast  on  you." 

"I  cant  understand  how  thai  window  got  broken/'  Mrs 


THE     SOTJXD      AND     THE     FURY 

Compson  said,  "Are  you  sure  it  was  done  yesterday?  it 
could  have  been  like  that  a  long  time,  with  the  warm 
weather.  The  upper  sash,  behind  the  shade  like  that.5* 

*Tve  told  you  for  the  last  time  that  it  happened  yester- 
day/* Jason  said.  TDont  you  reckon  I  know  the  room  I 
live  in?  Do  you  reckon  I  could  have  lived  in  it  a  week 
with  a  hole  in  the  window  you  could  stick  your  hand — ** 
Ms  voice  ceased,  ebbed.,  left  him  staring  at  his  mother 
with  eyes  that  for  an  instant  were  quite  empty  of  any- 
thing. It  was  as  though  his  eyes  were  holding  their  breath, 
wMle  his  mother  looked  at  him,  her  face  flaccid  and  quer- 
ulous, interminable,  clairvoyant  yet  obtuse.  As  they  sat  so 
Dilsey  said, 

"Quentin.  Dont  play  wid  me,  honey.  Come  on  to 
breakfast,  honey.  Dey  waitin  fer  you." 

"I  cant  understand  it,"  Mrs  Compson  said,  "It's  just  as 
if  somebody  had  tried  to  break  into  the  house — "  Jason 
sprang  up.  His  chair  crashed  over  backward.  "What — " 
Mrs  Compson  said,  staring  at  him  as  he  ran  past  her  and 
went  jumping  up  the  stairs,  where  he  met  Dilsey.  His 
face  was  now  in  shadow,  and  Dilsey  said, 

"She  sulHn.  Yo  ma  aint  unlocked — "  But  Jason  ran  on 
past  her  and  along  the  corridor  to  a  door.  He  didn't  call 
He  grasped  the  knob  and  tried  it,  then  he  stood  with  the 
knob  in  his  hand  and  his  head  bent  a  little,  as  if  he  were 
listening  to  something  much  further  away  than  the  di- 
mensioned room  beyond  the  door,  and  which  he  already 
heard.  His  attitude  was  that  of  one  who  goes  through 
the  motions  of  listening  in  order  to  deceive  himself  as  to 
what  he  already  hears.  Behind  him  Mrs  Compson 
mounted  the  stairs,  calling  his  name.  Then  she  saw  Dil- 
sey and  she  quit  calling  him  and  began  to  call  Dilsey  in- 
stead. 
*1  told  you  she  aint  unlocked  dat  do*  yit/*  Dilsey  said 


THE     SOXJVD     AND  "THE     FUliI 

When  she  spoke  he  turned  and  ran  toward  her,  but  his 
voice  was  quiet,  matter  of  fact.  "She  cany  the  key  with 
her?"  he  said.  "Has  she  got  it  now,  I  mean,  or  will  dhe 
have—" 

"Diisey,"  Mrs  Compson  said  on  the  stairs. 

"Is  which?"  Dilsey  said.  *°Whyn*t  you  let — " 

"The  key/*  Jason  said,  "To  that  room.  Does  she  cany  jt 
with  her  all  the  time.  Mother."  Then  he  saw  Mrs  Comp- 
son and  he  went  down  the  stairs  and  met  her.  "Give  me 
the  key/*  he  said.  He  fell  to  pawing  at  the  pockets  of  the 
rusty  black  dressing  sacque  she  wore.  She  resisted. 

"Jason,"  she  said,  "Jason!  Are  you  and  Dilsey  trying  to 
put  me  to  bed  again?"  she  said,  trying  to  fend  him  off, 
"Cant  you  even  let  me  have  Sunday  in  peace?" 

"The  key/'  Jason  said,  pawing  at  hei,  "Give  it  here/* 
He  looked  back  at  the  door,  as  if  he  expected  it  to  fly- 
open  before  he  could  get  back  to  it  with  the  key  he  did 
not  have. 

"You,  Dilsey!"  Mrs  Compson  said,  clutching  her  sacque 
about  her. 

"Give  me  the  key,  you  old  fool!"  Jason  cried  suddenly. 
From  her  pocket  he  tugged  a  huge  bunch  of  rusted  keys 
on  an  iron  ring  like  a  mediaeval  jailer's  and  ran  back  up 
the  hall  with  the  two  women  behind  him, 

"You,  Jason!"  Mrs  Compson  said.  "He  will  never  find 
the  right  one/'  she  said,  "You  know  I  never  let  anyone 
take  my  keys,  Dilsey/'  she  said.  She  began  to  wail. 

"Hush,"  Dilsey  said,  "He  aint  gwine  do  nothin  to  her. 
I  aint  gwine  let  him." 

"But  on  Sunday  morning,  in  my  own  house,"  Mrs 
Compson  said,  "When  I've  tried  so  hard  to  raise  them 
Christians.  Let  me  find  the  right  key,  Jason,"  she  said. 
She  put  her  hand  on  his  arm.  Then  she  began  to  struggle 
with  him,  but  he  flung  her  aside  with  a  motion  of  his  el- 


298        THE     SOUHB     AND     THE     FXJXY 

bow  and  looked  around  at  her  for  a  moment,  his  eyes 
cold  and  harried,  then  he  turned  to  the  door  again  and 
the  unwieldy  keys. 

"Hush,"  Dilsey  said,  'Tfou,  Jason!" 

"Something  terrible  has  happened/'  Mrs  Compson  said, 
wailing  again,  TL  know  it  has.  You,  Jason,"  she  said,  grasp- 
ing at  him  again.  "He  wont  even  let  me  find  the  key  to  a 
room  in  my  own  house!'* 

"Now,  now/'  Dilsey  said,  "Whut  kin  happen?  I  right 
here.  I  aint  gwine  let  him  hurt  her.  Quentin,**  she  said, 
raising  her  voice,  "Dont  you  be  skeered,  honey,  I'se  right 
here." 

The  door  opened,  swung  inward.  He  stood  in  it  for  a 
moment,  hiding  the  room,  then  he  stepped  aside.  "Go  in/" 
he  said  in  a  thick,  light  voice.  They  went  in.  It  was  not  a 
girl's  room.  It  was  not  anybody's  room,  and  the  faint 
scent  of  cheap  cosmetics  and  the  few  feminine  objects 
and  other  evidences  of  crude  and  hopeless  efforts  to  fem- 
inize it  but  added  to  its  anonymity,  giving  it  that  dead 
and  stereotyped  transience  of  rooms  in  assignation 
houses.  The  bed  had  not  been  disturbed.  On  the  floor  lay 
a  soiled  undergarment  of  cheap  silk  a  little  too  pink; 
from  a  half  open  bureau  drawer  dangled  a  single  stock- 
ing. The  window  was  open.  A  pear  tree  grew  there,  close 
against  the  house.  It  was  in  bloom  and  the  branches 
scraped  and  rasped  against  the  house  and  the  myriad  air, 
driving  in  the  window,  brought  into  the  room  the  forlorn 
scent  of  the  blossoms. 

"Dar  now,"  Dilsey  said,  "Didn't  1  told  you  she  all 
right?" 

"All  right?'*  Mrs  Compson  said.  Dilsey  followed  her 
into  the  room  and  touched  her. 

"You  come  on  and  lay  down,  now,"  she  said,  **I  find  her 
In  ten  minutes.** 


SOTTKD     A2^B     THE 

Mrs  Compson  shook  lier  off.  "Find  the  note/""  she  said* 
"Quentin  left  a  note  when  he  did  it." 

"All  right/'  Dilsey  said,  TH  find  hit  You  come  on  to  yo 
room,  now." 

*1  knew  the  minute  they  named  her  Quentin  this 
would  happen/'  Mrs  Compson  said.  She  went  to  the  bu- 
reau and  began  to  turn  over  the  scattered  objects  there — 
scent  bottles,  a  box  o£  powder,  a  chewed  pencil,  a  pair 
of  scissors  with  one  broken  blade  lying  upon  a  darned 
scarf  dusted  with  powder  and  stained  with  rouge.  "Find 
the  note/'  she  said. 

"I  is/'  Dilsey  &aid.  **You  come  on,  now.  Me  and  JascraTl 
find  hit  You  come  on  to  yo  room.** 

"Jason,**  Mrs  Compson  said,  "Where  is  he?n  She  went  to 
the  door.  Dilsey  followed  her  on  down  the  hall,  to  an- 
other door.  It  was  closed.  "Jason,"  she  called  through  the 
door.  There  was  no  answer.  She  tried  the  knob,  then  she 
called  him  again.  But  there  was  still  no  answer,  for  he 
was  hurling  tilings  backward  out  of  the  closet:  garments, 
shoes,  a  suitcase.  Then  he  emerged  carrying  a  sawn  sec- 
tion of  tongue-and-groove  planking  and  laid  it  down  and 
entered  the  closet  again  and  emerged  with  a  metal  box, 
He  set  it  on  the  bed  and  stood  looking  at  the  broken 
lock  while  he  dug  a  key  ring  from  his  pocket  and 
selected  a  key,  and  for  a  time  longer  he  stood  with  the 
selected  key  in  his  hand,  looking  at  the  broken  lock,  then 
he  put  the  keys  back  in  his  pocket  and  carefully  tilteci 
the  contents  of  the  box  out  upon  the  bed.  Still  carefully 
he  sorted  the  papers,  taking  diem  up  one  at  a  time  and 
shaking  them.  Then  he  upended  the  box  and  shook  it  too 
and  slowly  replaced  the  papers  and  stood  again,  looking 
at  the  broken  lock,  with  the  box  in  his  hands  and  his 
head  bent.  Outside  the  window  he  heard  some  jaybirds 
swirl  shrieking  past,  and  away,  their  cries  whipping  away 


300        THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FURY 

along  the  wind,  and  an  automobile  passed  somewhere 
and  died  away  also.  His  mother  spoke  his  name  again 
beyond  the  door,  but  he  didn't  move.  He  heard  Dilsey 
lead  her  away  up  the  hall,  and  then  a  door  closed.  Then 
he  replaced  the  box  in  the  closet  and  flung  the  garments 
back  into  it  and  went  down  stairs  to  the  telephone.  While 
he  stood  there  with  the  receiver  to  Ms  ear,  waiting,,  Dil- 
sey came  down  the  stairs.  She  looked  at  him,  without 
stopping,  and  went  on. 

The  wire  opened.  'This  is  Jason  Compson,"  he  said, 
bis  voice  so  harsh  and  thick  that  he  had  to  repeat  him- 
self.  "Jason  Compson/7  he  said,  controlling  his  voice. 
"Have  a  car  ready,  with  a  deputy,  if  you  cant  go,  in  ten 
minutes.  Ill  be  there — What? — Robbery.  My  house.  I 
know  who  it — Robbery,  I  say.  Have  a  car  ready — What? 
Aren't  you  a  paid  law  enforcement— Yes,  I'll  be  there  in 
five  minutes.  Have  that  car  ready  to  leave  at  once.  If  you 
dont.  111  report  it  to  the  governor." 

He  clapped  the  receiver  back  and  crossed  the  dining- 
room,  where  the  scarce-broken  meal  now  lay  cold  on 
the  table,  and  entered  the  kitchen.  Dilsey  was  filling  the 
hot  water  bottle.  Ben  sat,  tranquil  and  empty.  Beside 
him  Luster  looked  like  a  fice  dog,  brightly  watchful.  He 
Was  eating  something.  Jason  went  on  across  the  kitchen. 

"Aint  you  going  to  eat  no  breakfast?"  Dilsey  said.  He 
paid  her  no  attention.  "Go  and  eat  yo  breakfast,  Jason." 
He  went  on.  The  outer  door  banged  behind  him.  Luster 
rose  and  went  to  the  window  and  looked  out. 

"Whoo,"  he  said,  "Whut  happenin  up  dar?  He  been 
beatin'  Miss  Quentin?" 

"You  hush  yo  mouf,"  Dilsey  said.  "You  git  Benjy 
started  now  en  I  beat  yo  head  off.  You  keep  him  quiet  es 
you  kin  twell  I  get  back,  now."  She  screwed  the  cap  on 
the  bottle  and  went  out.  They  heard  her  go  up  the  stairs. 


THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FUBY 

then  they  heard  Jason  pass  the  house  in  his  car.  Then 
there  was  no  sound  in  the  kitchen  save  the  simmering 
murmur  of  the  kettle  and  the  clock. 

"You  know  whut  I  bet?"  Luster  said.  "I  bet  he  beat  her. 
I  bet  he  knock  her  in  de  head  en  now  he  gone  far  de 
doctor.  Dat's  whut  I  bet"  The  clock  tick-tocked,  solemn 
and  profound.  It  might  have  been  tibe  dry  pulse  ot  the 
decaying  house  itself;  after  a  while  it  whirred  and  cleared 
its  throat  and  struck  six  times.  Ben  looked  up  at  it,  then 
he  looked  at  the  bullet-like  silhouette  of  Luster's  head  in 
the  window  and  he  begun  to  bob  his  head  again,  drool- 
ing. He  whimpered. 

"Hush  up,  loony/5  Luster  said  without  turning.  "Look 
like  we  aint  gwine  git  to.  go  to  no  church  today."  But 
Ben  sat  in  the  chair,  his  big  soft  hands  dangling  between 
his  knees,  moaning  faintly.  Suddenly  he  wept,  a  slow  bel- 
lowing sound,  meaningless  and  sustained.  "Hush/'  Lus- 
ter said.  He  turned  and  lifted  his  hand.  "You  want  me  to 
whup  you?"  But  Ben  looked  at  him,  bellowing  slowly 
with  each  expiration.  Luster  came  and  shook  him.  "You 
hush  dis  minute!"  he  shouted.  "Here,"  he  said.  He  hauled 
Ben  out  of  the  chair  and  dragged  the  chair  around  facing 
the  stove  and  opened  the  door  to  the  firebox  and  shoved! 
Ben  into  the  chair.  They  looked  like  a  tug  nudging  at  a 
clumsy  tanker  in  a  narrow  dock.  Ben  sat  down  again 
facing  the  rosy  door.  He  hushed.  Then  they  heard  the 
clock  again,  and  Dilsey  slow  on  the  stairs.  When  she  en- 
tered he  began  to  whimper  again.  Then  he  lifted  his 
voice, 

"Whut  you  done  to  him?"  Dilsey  said.  "Why  cant  you 
let  him  lone  dis  mawnin,  of  all  times?" 

"I  aint  doin  nothin  to  him,"  Luster  said.  "Mr  Jason 
skeered  him,  dat's  whut  hit  is.  He  aint  kilt  Miss 
is  he?" 


3®*        THE     SOTJHD     AND     THE 

THush,  Benjy  ,w  Dilsey  said.  He  hushed.  She  went  to  the 
window  and  looked  out.  "Is  it  quit  rainin?"  she  said. 

"Yesstun/9  Luster  said.  "Quit  long  time  ago." 

"Den  ya'll  go  out  do's  a  while,"  she  said.  "I  jes  got  Miss 
Cahline  quiet  now/7 

"Is  we  gwine  to  church?"  Luster  said. 

T[  let  you  know  bout  dat  when  de  time  come.  You 
keep  him  away  fura  de  house  tweU  I  calls  you." 

"Kin  we  go  to  de  pastuh?"  Luster  said. 

*AU  right.  Only  you  keep  him  away  fum  de  house.  I 
done  stood  all  I  kin." 

*Yessum,"  Luster  said.  "Whar  Mr  Jason  gone,  mammy?*" 

TDat's  some  mo  of  yo  business,  aint  it?"  Dilsey  said.  She 
began  to  clear  the  table.  "Hush,  Benjy.  Luster  gwine  take 
you  out  to  play.** 

*Whut  he  done  to  Miss  Quentin,  mammy?"  Luster  said. 

"Aint  done  nothin  to  her.  You  all  git  on  outen  here.** 

*1  bet  she  aint  here/*  Luster  said. 

Dilsey  looked  at  him.  "How  you  know  she  aint  here?** 

**Me  and  Benjy  seed  her  clamb  out  de  window  last 
night  Didn't  us,  Benjy?" 

"You  did?"  Dilsey  said,  looking  at  him. 

*We  sees  her  doin  hit  ev'y  night/'  Luster  said,  "Clamb 
light  down  dat  pear  tree/' 

TDont  you  lie  to  me,  nigger  boy/*  Dilsey  said. 

T  aint  lyin.  Ask  Benjy  ef  I  is." 

*Whyn't  you  say  somethin  about  it,  den?" 

**'Twam't  none  o  my  business,7*  Luster  said.  "I  aiBt 
gwine  git  mixed  up  in  white  folks'  business.  Come  on 
here,  Benjy,  las  go  out  do's/' 

They  went  out.  Dilsey  stood  for  awhile  at  the  table, 
then  she  went  and  cleared  the  breakfast  things  from  the 
diningroom  and  ate  her  breakfast  and  cleaned  up  tibe 
kitchen.  Then  she  removed  her  apron  and  hung  it  up 


THE     SOUND     A^"B     THE     FUBY        3°3 

and  went  to  the  foot  of  the  stairs  and  listened  for  a  mo- 
ment. There  was  no  sound.  She  donned  the  overcoat  and 
the  hat  and  went  across  to  her  cabin. 

The  rain  had  stopped.  The  air  now  drove  out  of  the 
southeast,  broken  overhead  into  blue  patches.  Upon  fee 
crest  of  a  hill  beyond  the  trees  and  roofs  and  spires  of 
iown  sunlight  lay  like  a  pale  scrap  of  cloth,  was  blotted 
away.  Upon  the  air  a  bell  came,  then  as  if  at  a  signal*. 
other  bells  took  up  the  sound  and  repeated  it. 

The  cabin  door  opened  and  Dilsey  emerged,  again  in 
the  maroon  cape  and  the  purple  gown,  and  wearing 
soiled  white  elbow-length  gloves  and  minus  her  head- 
cloth  now.  She  came  into  the  yard  and  called  Luster.  She 
waited  awhile,  then  she  went  to  the  house  and  around  It 
to  the  cellar  door,  moving  close  to  the  wall,  and  looked 
into  the  door.  Ben  sat  on  the  steps.  Before  him  Luster 
squatted  on  the  damp  floor.  He  held  a  saw  in  his  left 
hand,  the  blade  sprung  a  little  by  pressure  of  his  hand, 
and  he  was  in  the  act  of  striking  the  blade  with  the  worn 
wooden  mallet  with  which  she  had  been  making  beaten 
biscuit  for  more  than  thirty  years.  The  saw  gave  forth  a 
single  sluggish  twang  that  ceased  with  lifeless  alacrity, 
leaving  the  blade  in  a  thin  clean  curve  between  Luster9* 
hand  and  the  floor.  Still,  inscrutable,  it  bellied. 

TDat's  de  way  he  done  hit,"  Luster  said.  "I  jes  aint  f  ouaa 
de  right  thing  to  hit  it  wid." 

"Dat's  whut  you  doin,  is  it?'3  Dilsey  said.  "Bring  me  dat 
mallet,"  she  said. 

"I  aint  hurt  hit,"  Luster  said. 

"Bring  hit  here/*  Dilsey  said.  'Tut  dat  saw  whar  you 
got  hit  first." 

He  put  the  saw  away  and  brought  the  mallet  to  her. 
Then  Ben  wailed  again,  hopeless  and  prolonged.  It 
nothing.  Just  sound.  It  might  have  been  all  time  and 


THE     SOTTED     AXB     THE     FURY 

Justice  and  sorrow  become  vocal  for  an  instant  by  a  con- 
fttnction  of  planets. 

"Listen  at  him/'  Luster  said,  "He  been  gwine  on  dat 
way  ev'y  since  you  sont  us  outen  de  house.  I  dont  know 
whut  got  in  to  him  dis  mawnin." 

TBiing  him  here/'  Dilsey  said. 

**Come  on?  Benjy/*  Luster  said.  He  went  back  down 
the  steps  tod  took  Ben's  arm.  He  came  obediently,  wail- 
ing, that  slow  hoarse  sound  that  ships  make,  that  seems 
to  begin  before  the  sound  itself  has  started,  seems  to 
cease  before  the  sound  itself  has  stopped. 

"Run  and  git  his  cap,**  Dilsey  said.  "Dont  make  no 
noise  Miss  Cahline  kin  hear.  Hurry,  now.  We  already 
late." 

**She  gwine  hear  him  anyhow,  ef  you  dont  stop  him." 
Luster  said. 

"He  stop  when  we  git  off  de  place/*  Dilsey  said.  "He 
smellin  hit.  Dat's  whut  hit  is." 

"Smell  whut,  mammy?"  Luster  said. 

*TTou  go  git  dat  cap/*  Dilsey  said.  Luster  went  on.  They 
stood  in  the  cellar  door,  Ben  one  step  below  her.  The  sky 
was  broken  now  into  scudding  patches  that  dragged  their 
swift  shadows  up  out  of  the  shabby  garden,  over  the 
broken  fence  and  across  the  yard.  Dilsey  stroked  Ben's 
head,  slowly  and  steadily,  smoothing  the  bang  upon  his 
brow.  He  wailed  quietly,  unhurriedly.  "Hush,"  Dilsey 
said,  "Hush,  now.  We  be  gone  in  a  minute.  Hush,  now." 
He  wailed  quietly  and  steadily. 

Luster  returned,  wearing  a  stiff  new  straw  hat  with  a 
coloured  band  and  carrying  a  cloth  cap.  The  hat  seemed 
to  isolate  Luster's  skull,  in  the  beholder's  eye  as  a  spot*1 
fight  would,  in  all  its  individual  planes  and  angles.  So 
peculiarly  individual  was  its  shape  that  at  first  glance  the 


TKB     SOUND     AXi)     THE     i1  U  K  V        3°l 

hat  appeared  to  be  on  the  head  of  someone  standing  im- 
mediately behind  Luster.  Dilsey  looked  at  the  hat. 

"Whyn't  you  wear  yo  old  hat?"  she  said. 

""'Couldn't  find  hit/'  Luster  said. 

"I  bet  you  couldn't.  I  bet  you  fixed  hit  last  night  so  you 
couldn't  find  hit.  You  fixin  to  ruin  dat  im." 

"Aw,  mammy/7  Luster  said,  **Hit  aiiit  gwine  rain/5* 

"How  you  know?  You  go  git  dat  old  hat  en  put  dat 
new  un  away." 

"Aw,  mammy." 

"Den  you  go  git  de  umbreller." 

"Aw,  mammy." 

'Take  yo  choice/'  Dilsey  said.  "Git  yo  old  hat,  er  da 
umbreller.  I  dont  keer  which." 

Luster  went  to  the  cabin.  Ben  wailed  quietly. 

"Come  on/'  Dilsey  said,  "Day  kin  ketch  up  wid  us.  We 
gwine  to  hear  de  singin."  They  went  around  the  house^ 
toward  the  gate.  "Hush/'  Dilsey  said  from  time  to  time  as 
they  went  down  the  drive.  They  reached  the  gate.  Dil- 
sey opened  it.  Luster  was  coming  down  the  drive  behind 
them,  carrying  the  umbrella.  A  woman  was  with  him* 
"Here  dey  come/'  Dilsey  said.  They  passed  out  the  gate* 
"Now,  den/'  she  said.  Ben  ceased.  Luster  and  his  mcthei 
overtook  them.  Frony  wore  a  dress  of  bright  blue  silk 
and  a  flowered  hat.  She  was  a  thin  woman,  with  a  flat* 
pleasant  face. 

"You  got  six  weeks'  work  right  dar  on  yo  back,*7  Dilsey 
said.  "Whut  you  gwine  do  ef  hit  rain?" 

"Git  wet,  I  reckon/'  Frony  said.  "I  aint  never  stopped 
no  rain  yit." 

"Mammy  always  talkin  bout  hit  gwine  rain/'  Lustef 
said. 

"Ef  I  dont  worry  bout  /all,  I  dont  know  who  is/7  Dilsejf 
said.  "Come  on,  we  already  late." 


$06        THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FURY 

"Rev'un  Shegog  gwine  preach  today  "  Frony  said. 

"Is?w  Dilsey  said.  "Who  him?" 

*He  fum  Saint  Looey/'  Frony  said.  TDat  big 
preacher.** 

"Huh,"  Dilsey  said,  "Whut  dey  needs  is  a  man  Inn  put 
de  fear  of  God  into  dese  here  triflin  young  niggers." 

*Rev*un  Shegog  gwine  preach  today,"  Frony  said.  "So 
dey  tells." 

They  went  on  along  the  street.  Along  its  quiet  length 
white  people  in  bright  clumps  moved  churchward,  under 
the  windy  bells,  walking  now  and  then  in  the  random 
and  tentative  sun.  The  wind  was  gust)7,  out  of  the  south- 
east, chill  and  raw  after  the  warm  days. 

*I  wish  you  wouldn't  keep  on  bringin  him  to  church, 
mammy,"  Frony  said.  "Folks  talkiri." 

"Whut  folks?"  Dilsey  said. 

"I  hears  em,"  Frony  said. 

"And  I  knows  whut  kind  of  folks,"  Dilsey  said,  "Trash 
white  folks.  Dat's  who  it  is.  Thinks  he  aint  good  enough 
fer  white  church,  but  nigger  church  aint  good  enough 
fer  him." 

"Dey  talks,  jes  de  same,"  Frony  said. 

"Den  you  send  um  to  me,"  Dilsey  said.  "Tell  um  de 
good  Lawd  dont  keer  whether  he  smart  er  not.  Dont  no- 
body but  white  trash  keer  dat" 

A  street  turned  off  at  right  angles,  descending,  and  be- 
came a  dirt  road.  On  either  hand  the  land  dropped  more 
sharply;  a  broad  flat  dotted  with  small  cabins  whose 
Weathered  roofs  were  on  a  level  with  the  crown  of  the 
road.  They  were  set  in  small  grassless  plots  littered  with 
broken  things,  bricks,  planks,  crockery,  things  of  a  once 
utilitarian  value.  What  growth  there  was  consisted  of 
rank  weeds  and  the  trees  were  mulberries  and  locusts 
and  sycamores — trees  that  partook  also  of  the  foul  desic- 


THB     SOTJXD     AND     THE     FUFY 

cation  which  surrounded  the  houses;  trees  whose  very 
burgeoning  seemed  to  be  the  sad  and  stubborn  remnant 
of  September,  as  if  even  spring  had  passed  them  by* 
leaving  them  to  feed  upon  the  rich  and  unmistakable 
smell  of  negroes  in  which  they  grew. 

From  the  doors  negroes  spoke  to  them  as  they  passed* 
to  Dilsey  usually: 

"Sis*  Gibson!  How  you  dis  raawnin?** 

*Tm  well.  Is  you  well?" 

*Tm  right  well,  I  thank  you."* 

They  emerged  from  the  cabins  and  struggled  up  the 
shading  levee  to  the  road — men  in  staid,  hard  brown  or 
black,  with  gold  watch  chains  and  now  and  then  a  stick; 
young  men  in  cheap  violent  blues  or  stripes  and  swagger- 
ing hats;  women  a  little  stiffly  sibilant,  and  children  in 
garments  bought  second  hand  of  white  people,  who 
looked  at  Ben  with  the  covertness  of  nocturnal  animals: 

"I  bet  you  wont  go  up  en  tech  him." 

"How  come  I  wont?" 

"I  bet  you  wont.  I  bet  you  skeered  to." 

"He  wont  hurt  folks.  He  des  a  loony." 

"How  come  a  loony  wont  hurt  folks?" 

"Dat  un  wont.  I  teclied  him/* 

<el  bet  you  wont  now." 

"Case  Miss  Dilsey  lookin." 

"You  wont  no  ways." 

"He  dont  hurt  folks.  He  des  a  loony." 

And  steadily  the  older  people  speaking  to  Dilsey, 
though,  unless  they  were  quite  old,  Dilsey  permitted 
Frony  to  respond. 

"Mammy  aint  feelin  well  dis  mawnin." 

TDat's  too  bad.  But  Rev'un  Shegogll  cure  dat.  Hel 
give  her  de  comfort  en  de  unburdening 

The  road  rose  again,  to  a  scene  like  a  painted  backr 


308         THE     SOUXD      AND     THE     FURY 

drop.  Notched  into  a  cut  of  red  clay  crowned  with  oaks 
lie  road  appeared  to  stop  short  off,  like  a  cut  ribbon. 
jBeside  it  a  weathered  church  lifted  its  crazy  steeple  like 
a  painted  church,  and  the  whole  scene  was  as  flat  and 
without  perspective  as  a  painted  cardboard  set  upon  the 
ultimate  edge  of  the  flat  earth,  against  the  windy  sunlight 
of  space  and  April  and  a  midmorning  filled  with  bells. 
Toward  the  church  they  thronged  with  slow  sabbath  de- 
liberation. The  women  and  children  went  on  in,  the  men 
stopped  outside  and  talked  in  quiet  groups  until  the  bell 
ceased  ringing.  Then  they  too  entered. 

The  church  had  been  decorated,  with  sparse  flowers 
from  kitchen  gardens  and  hedgerows,  and  with  streamers 
of  coloured  crepe  paper.  Above  the  pulpit  hung  a  bat- 
tered Christmas  bell,  the  accordion  sort  that  collapses. 
The  pulpit  was  empty,  though  the  choir  was  already  in 
pkce,  fanning  themselves  although  it  was  not  warm. 

Most  of  the  women  were  gathered  on  one  side  of  the 
room.  They  were  talking.  Then  the  bell  struck  one  time 
and  they  dispersed  to  their  seats  and  the  congregation  sat 
for  an  instant,  expectant.  The  bell  struck  again  one  time. 
The  choir  rose  and  began  to  sing  and  the  congregation 
turned  its  head  as  one,  as  six  small  children — four  girls 
with  tight  pigtails  bound  with  small  scraps  of  cloth  like 
butterflies,  and  two  boys  with  close  napped  heads, — en- 
tered and  marched  up  the  aisle,  strung  together  in  a  har- 
ness of  white  ribbons  and  flowers,  and  followed  by  two 
men  in  single  file.  The  second  man  was  huge,  of  a  light 
coffee  colour,  imposing  in  a  frock  coat  and  white  tie.  His 
head  was  magisterial  and  profound,  his  neck  rolled  above ' 
his  collar  in  rich  folds.  But  he  was  familiar  to  them,  and 
so  the  heads  were  still  reverted  when  he  had  passed,  and 
it  was  not  until  the  choir  ceased  singing  that  they  real- 
ised that  the  visiting  clergyman  had  already  entered^ 


THE     SOUND     AND     THE      FURY        3°9 

and  when  they  saw  the  man  who  had  preceded 
minister  enter  the  pulpit  still  ahead  of  him  an  indescrfb^ 
able  sound  went  up,  a  sigh,  a  sound  of  astonishment 
disappointment. 

The  visitor  was  undersized,  in  a  shabby  alpaca  coat* 
He  had  a  wizened  black  face  like  a  small,  aged  monkey. 
And  aH  the  while  that  the  choir  sang  again  and  while 
six  children  rose  and  sang  in  thin,  frightened,  time- 
less whispers,  they  watched  the  insignificant  looking  man 
sitting  dwarfed  and  countrified  by  the  minister's  imposing 
bulk,  with  something  like  consternation.  They  were  still 
looking  at  him  with  consternation  and  unbelief  when  the 
minister  rose  and  introduced  him  in  rich,  rolling  tones 
whose  very  unction  served  to  increase  the  visitor's  insig- 
nificance. 

"En  dey  brung  dat  all  de  way  fum  Saint  Looey/*  Fxony 
whispered. 

*Tve  knowed  de  Lawd  to  use  cuiser  tools  dan  dat,** 
Dilsey  said.  "Hush,  now/*  she  said  to  Ben,  "Dey  fixin  to 
sing  again  in  a  minute." 

When  the  visitor  rose  to  speak  he  sounded  like  a  white 
man.  His  voice  was  level  and  cold.  It  sounded  too  big  to 
have  come  from  him  and  they  listened  at  first  through 
curiosity,  as  they  would  have  to  a  monkey  talking.  They 
began  to  watch  him  as  they  would  a  man  on  a  tight  rope. 
They  even  forgot  his  insignificant  appearance  in  the  vir- 
tuosity with  which  he  ran  and  poised  and  swooped  upon 
the  cold  inflectionless  wire  of  his  voice,  so  that  at  last,, 
when  with  a  sort  of  swooping  glide  he  came  to  rest  again 
beside  the  reading  desk  with  one  arm  resting  upon  it  at 
shoulder  height  and  his  monkey  body  as  reft  of  all  mo- 
tion as  a  mummy  or  an  emptied  vessel,  the  congregation 
sighed  as  if  it  waked  from  a  collective  dream  and  moved 
a  little  IB  its  seats.  Behind  the  pulpit  the  choir  fanned 


JIO        THE      S0IIXP      AXD      THE      FURY 

Steadily,  Dilsey  whispered,  "Hush,  now.  Dey  fixin  to  sing 
in  a  minute/' 

Then  a  voice  said,  "Brethren." 

The  preacher  had  not  moved.  His  arm  lay  yet  across 
the  desk,  and  he  still  held  that  pose  while  the  voice  died 
in  sonorous  echoes  between  the  walls.  It  was  as  different 
as  day  and  dark  from  his  former  tone,  with  a  sad,  tim- 
brous  quality  like  an  alto  horn,  sinking  into  their  hearts 
and  speaking  there  again  when  it  had  ceased  in  fading 
and  cumulate  echoes. 

"Brethren  and  sisteren/"  it  said  again.  The  preacher  re- 
moved his  arm  and  he  began  to  walk  back  and  forth  be- 
fore the  desk,  his  hands  clasped  behind  him,  a  meagre 
figure,  hunched  over  upon  itself  like  that  of  one  long  im- 
mured in  striving  with  the  implacable  earth,  "I  got  the 
recollection  and  the  blood  of  the  Lamb!"  He  tramped 
5teadily  back  and  forth  beneath  the  twisted  paper  and 
the  Christmas  bell,  hunched,  his  hands  clasped  behind 
him.  He  was  like  a  worn  small  rock  whelmed  by  the  suc- 
cessive waves  of  his  voice.  With  his  body  he  seemed  to 
feed  the  voice  that,  succubus  like,  had  fleshed  its  teeth  in 
turn.  And  the  congregation  seemed  to  watch  with  its 
own  eyes  while  the  voice  consumed  him,  until  he  was 
nothing  and  they  were  nothing  and  there  was  not  even  a 
voice  but  instead  their  hearts  were  speaking  to  one  an- 
other in  chanting  measures  beyond  the  need  for  words, 
so  that  when  he  came  to  rest  against  the  reading  desk, 
his  monkey  face  lifted  and  his  whole  attitude  that  of  a 
serene,  tortured  crucifix  that  transcended  its  shabbiness 
and  insignificance  and  made  it  of  no  moment,  a  long 
moaning  expulsion  of  breath  rose  from  them,  and  a 
woman's  single  soprano:  "Yes,  Jesus!" 

As  the  scudding  day  passed  overhead  the  dingy  win- 
dows glowed  and  faded  in  ghostly  retrograde.  A  car 


THE     SOUND     AXD     THE     FXJEY        31* 

passed  along  the  road  outside,  labouring  in  the  sandr 
died  away,  Dilsey  sat  bolt  upright,  her  hand  on  Ben's 
knee.  Two  tears  slid  down  her  fallen  cheeks,  in  and  out 
of  the  myriad  coruscations  of  immolation  and  abnegation 
and  time. 

"Brethren/'  the  minister  said  in  a  harsh  whisper,  with- 
out moving. 

'"Yes,  Jesus!"  The  woman's  voice  said,  hushed  yet 

"Breddren  en  sistuhn!"  His  voice  rang  again,  with  tibe 
horns.  He  removed  his  arm  and  stood  erect  and  raised 
his  hands.  "I  got  de  ricklickshun  en  de  blood  of  de 
Lamb!"  They  did  not  mark  just  when  his  intonation,  his 
pronunciation,  became  negroid,  they  just  sat  swaying  a 
little  in  their  seats  as  the  voice  took  them  into  itself. 

"When  de  long,  cold — Oh,  I  tells  you,  breddren,  when 
de  long,  cold — I  sees  de  light  en  I  sees  de  word,  po  sin- 
ner! Dey  passed  away  in  Egypt,  de  swingin.  chariots;  de 
generations  passed  away.  Wus  a  rich  man:  whar  lie  now, 

0  breddren?  Was  a  po  man:  whar  he  now,  O  sistuhn?  Oh 

1  tells  you,  ef  you  aint  got  de  milk  en  de  dew  of  de  old 
salvation  when  de  long,  cold  years  rolls  away!" 

"Yes,  Jesus!" 

"I  tells  you,  breddren,  en  I  tells  you,  sistuhn,  deyll 
come  a  time.  Po  sinner  saying  Let  me  lay  down  wid  de 
Lawd,  lemme  lay  down  my  load.  Den  whut  Jesus  gwine 
say,  O  breddren?  O  sistuhn?  Is  you  got  de  ricklickshun 
en  de  Blood  of  de  Lamb?  Case  I  aint  gwine  load  down 
heaven!'1 

He  fumbled  in  his  coat  and  took  out  a  handkerchief 
and  mopped  his  face.  A  low  concerted  sound  rose 
from  the  congregation:  "Mmmmmmmmmmnimrnr  The 
woman's  voice  said,  "Yes,  Jesus!  Jesus!" 

"Breddren!  Look  at  dem  little  chillen  settin  dar.  Jesus 
wus  like  dat  once.  He  mammy  suffered  de  glory  en  do 


THE     SOUND      AND     THE     FURY 

pangs.  Sometime  maybe  she  belt  him  at  de  nightfall, 
whilst  de  angels  singin  him  to  sleep;  maybe  she  look  out 
de  do'  en  see  de  Roman  po-lice  passing  He  tramped  back 
and  forth,  mopping  his  face.  "Listen,  breddren!  I  sees  de 
day.  Ma'y  settin  in  de  do"  wid  Jesus  on  her  lap,  de  little 
Jesus.  Like  dem  chillen  dar,  de  little  Jesus.  I  hears  de 
fmgels  singin  de  peaceful  songs  en  de  glory;  1  sees  de 
closin  eyes;  sees  Mary  jump  up,  sees  de  sojer  face:  We 
gwine  to  kill!  We  gwine  to  kill!  We  gwine  to  kill  yo  little 
Jesus!  I  hears  de  weepin  en  de  lamentation  of  de  po 
mammy  widout  de  salvation  en  de  word  of  God!" 

"Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm!  Jesus!  Little  JesusT 
and  another  voice,  rising: 

"I  sees,  O  Jesus!  Oh  I  sees!"  and  still  another,  without 
words,  like  bubbles  rising  in  water. 

"I  sees  hit,  breddren!  I  sees  hit!  Sees  de  blastin,  blindin 
sight!  I  sees  Calvary,  wid  de  sacred  trees,  sees  de  thief  ea 
de  murderer  en  de  least  of  dese;  I  hears  de  boasting  en  de 
braggin:  Ef  you  be  Jesus,  lif  up  yo  tree  en  walk!  I  hears 
de  wailin  of  women  en  de  evenin  lamentations;  I  hears 
de  weepin  en  de  cryin  en  de  turnt-away  face  of  God: 
dey  done  kilt  Jesus;  dey  done  kilt  my  Son!" 

"Mmmmmmmmmmmmm.  Jesus!  I  sees,  O  Jesus!" 

"O  blind  sinner!  Breddren,  I  tells  you;  sistuhn,  I  says  to 
you,  when  de  Lawd  did  turn  His  mighty  face,  say,  Aint 
gwine  overload  heaven!  I  can  see  de  widowed  God  shet 
His  do';  I  sees  de  whelmin  flood  roll  between;  I  sees  de 
darkness  en  de  death  everlastin  upon  de  generations. 
Den,  lo!  Breddren!  Yes,  breddren!  Whut  I  see?  Whut  I 
see,  O  sinner?  I  sees  de  resurrection  en  de  light;  sees  de 
meek  Jesus  sayin  Dey  kilt  Me  dat  ye  shall  live  again;  1 
died  dat  dem  whut  sees  en  believes  shall  never  die.  Bred- 
O breddren!  I  sees  de  doom  crack  en  hears  de 


THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FXJBY        3I3 

golden  horns  shoutin  down  de  glory,  en  de  arisen  dead 
whut  got  de  blood  en  de  ricklickshun  of  de  Lamb!" 

In  the  midst  of  the  voices  and  the  hands  Ben  sat,  rapt 
in  his  sweet  blue  gaze.  Dilsey  sat  bolt  upright  beside,  cry- 
ing rigidly  and  quietly  in  the  annealment  and  the  blooc? 
of  the  remembered  Lamb, 

As  they  walked  through  the  bright  noon,  up  the  sandy 
road  with  the  dispersing  congregation  talking  easily 
again  group  to  group,  she  continued  to  weep,  unmindful 
of  the  talk, 

"He  sho  a  preacher,  mon!  He  didn't  look  like  much  at 
first,  but  hush!" 

"He  seed  de  power  en  de  glory.'* 

"Yes,  suh.  He  seed  hit.  Face  to  face  he  seed  hit/' 

Dilsey  made  no  sound,  her  face  did  not  quiver  as  the 
tears  took  their  sunken  and  devious  courses,  walking  with 
her  head  up,  making  no  effort  to  dry  them  away  even. 

"Whyn't  you  quit  dat,  mammy?"  Frony  said.  "Wid  all 
dese  people  lookin.  We  be  passin  white  folks  soon." 

"I've  seed  de  first  en  de  last,"  Dilsey  said.  "Never  you 
mind  me." 

"First  en  last  whut?"  Frony  said. 

"Never  you  mind,"  Dilsey  said.  "I  seed  de  beginnin^ 
en  now  I  sees  de  endin." 

Before  they  reached  the  street,  though,  she  stopped 
and  lifted  her  skirt  and  dried  her  eyes  on  the  hem  of 
her  topmost  underskirt.  Then  they  went  on.  Ben  sham- 
bled along  beside  Dilsey,  watching  Luster  who  anticked 
along  ahead,  the  umbrella  in  his  hand  and  his  new  straw 
hat  slanted  viciously  in  the  sunlight,  like  a  big  foolish 
dog  watching  a  small  clever  one.  They  reached  the  gate 
and  entered.  Immediately  Ben  began  to  whimper  agairij 
and  for  a  while  all  of  them  looked  up  the  drive  at  th© 
square,  paintless  house  with  its  rotting  portico. 


THTE      SO0JNTD      A2STD      THE 

**Whut?s  gwine  on  up  dar  today?'*  Frony  said.  "Some- 
thing is/* 

"Nothin,"  Dilsey  said.  *Tou  tend  to  yo  business  en  let 
de  white  folks  tend  to  deir'n." 

"Somethin  is/*  Frony  said.  "I  heard  him  first  tiling  dis 
mawnin.  Taint  none  of  my  business,  dough." 

"En  I  knows  whut,  too/*  Luster  said. 

"You  knows  mo  dan  you  got  any  use  fer/*  Dilsey  said. 
**Aint  you  Jes  heard  Frony  say  hit  aint  none  of  yo  busi- 
ness? You  take  Benjy  on  to  de  back  and  keep  him  quiet 
twell  I  put  dinner  on." 

"I  knows  whar  Miss  Quentin  is,"  Luster  said. 

TDen  jes  keep  hit/'  Dilsey  said.  "Soon  es  Quentin  need 
any  of  yo  egvice,  I'll  let  you  know.  Y'all  g'awn  en  play  in 
de  back,  now." 

"You  know  whut  gwine  happen  soon  es  dey  start  playin 
dat  ball  over  yonder/'  Luster  said. 

*T)ey  wont  start  fer  awhile  yit.  By  dat  time  T.  P.  be 
here  to  take  him  ridin.  Here,  you  gimme  dat  new  hat** 

Luster  gave  her  the  hat  and  he  and  Ben  went  on 
across  the  back  yard.  Ben  was  still  whimpering,  though 
not  loud.  Dilsey  and  Frony  went  to  the  cabin.  After  a 
while  Dilsey  emerged,  again  in  the  faded  calico  dress,  and 
went  to  the  kitchen.  The  fire  had  died  down.  There  was 
no  sound  in  the  house.  She  put  on  the  apron  and  went  up 
stairs.  There  was  no  sound  anywhere.  Quentin's  room  was 
as  they  had  left  it.  She  entered  and  picked  up  the  under- 
garment and  put  the  stocking  back  in  the  drawer  and 
closed  it.  Mrs  Compson's  door  was  closed.  Dilsey  stood 
beside  it  for  a  moment,  listening.  Then  she  opened  it 
and  entered,  entered  a  pervading  reek  of  camphor.  The 
shades  were  drawn,  the  room  in  halflight,  and  the  bed, 
so  that  at  first  she  thought  Mrs  Compson  was  asleep  and 
Was  about  to  close  the  door  when  the  other  spoke. 


SOUND     ANB     THE     FUBT 

"Well?"  she  said,  "What  is  it?" 

"Hit's  me/*  Dilsey  said.  "You  want  anything?* 

Mrs  Compson  didn't  answer.  After  awhile,  without 
moving  her  head  at  all,  she  said:  c<Where*s  Jason?** 

"He  aint  come  back  yit,"  Dilsey  said.  "Whut  y0a 
want?" 

Mrs  Compson  said  nothing.  Like  so  many  cold,  weak 
people,  when  faced  at  last  by  the  incontrovertible  disas- 
ter she  exhumed  from  somewhere  a  sort  of  fortitude, 
strength.  In  her  case  it  was  an  unshakable  conviction  re- 
garding the  yet  unplumbed  event.  "Well,"  she  said  pres- 
ently, "Did  yon  find  it?" 

"Find  whut?  Whut  you  talkin  about?" 

"The  note.  At  least  she  would  have  enough  considera* 
tion  to  leave  a  note.  Even  Quentin  did  that." 

'Whut  you  talkin  about?"  Dilsey  said,  ""Dent  you  know 
she  all  right?  I  bet  she  be  wallcin  right  in  dis  do*  befo 
dark." 

"Fiddlesticks,"  Mrs  Compson  said,  "It's  in  the  blood. 
Like  uncle,  like  niece.  Or  mother.  I  dont  know  which 
would  be  worse.  I  dont  seem  to  care." 

"Whut  you  keep  on  talkin  that  way  fur?"  Dilsey  said* 
"Whut  she  want  to  do  anything  like  that  fur?" 

"I  dont  know.  What  reason  did  Quentin  have?  Under 
God's  heaven  what  reason  did  he  have?  It  cant  be  simply 
to  flout  and  hurt  me.  Whoever  God  is,  He  would  not  per- 
mit that.  I'm  a  lady.  You  might  not  believe  that  from  my 
offspring,  but  I  am/' 

"You  des  wait  en  see,"  Dilsey  said.  "She  be  here  by 
night,  right  dar  in  her  bed."  Mrs  Compson  said  nothing* 
The  camphor-soaked  cloth  lay  upon  her  brow.  The  black 
robe  lay  across  the  foot  of  the  bed.  Dilsey  stood  with  her 
hand  on  the  door  knob. 

"Well,"  Mrs  Compson  said.  '"What  do  you  want?  Ar@ 


3"        THE     SOUKD     ANB     THE 

you  going  to  fix  some  dinner  for  Jason  and  Benjamin  or 
not?" 

^Jason  aint  come  yit/'  Dilsey  said.  "I  gwine  fix  some- 
thin.  You  sho  you  dont  want  nothin?  Yo  bottle  still  hot 
enough?" 

"You  might  hand  me  my  Bible." 

*1  give  hit  to  you  dis  mawnln,  befo  I  left/* 

"You  laid  it  on  the  edge  of  the  bed.  How  long  did  you 
expect  it  to  stay  there?" 

Dilsey  crossed  to  the  bed  and  groped  among  the 
shadows  beneath  the  edge  of  it  and  found  the  Bible,  face 
down.  She  smoothed  the  bent  pages  and  laid  the  book  on 
the  bed  again.  Mrs  Compson  didn't  open  her  eyes.  Her 
Jiair  and  the  pillow  were  the  same  color,  beneath  the 
wimple  of  the  medicated  cloth  she  looked  Like  an  old  ram 
praying.  "Dont  put  it  there  again/'  she  said,  without 
•pening  her  eyes.  'That's  where  you  put  it  before.  Do 
you  want  me  to  have  to  get  out  of  bed  to  pick  it  up?" 

Dilsey  reached  the  book  across  her  and  laid  it  on  the 
Inroad  side  of  the  bed.  "You  cant  see  to  read,  noways/* 
she  said.  "You  want  me  to  raise  de  shade  a  little?" 

"No.  Let  them  alone.  Go  on  and  fix  Jason  something  to 
eat" 

Dilsey  went  out.  She  closed  the  door  and  returned  to 
the  kitchen.  The  stove  was  almost  cold.  While  she  stood 
there  the  clock  above  the  cupboard  struck  ten  times. 
**One  oclock/'  she  said  aloud,  "Jason  aint  comin  home.  Ise 
seed  de  first  en  de  last/*  she  said,  looking  at  the  cold 
stove,  T  seed  de  first  en  de  last."  She  set  out  some  cold 
food  on  a  table.  As  she  moved  back  and  forth  she  sang  a 
hymn.  She  sang  the  first  two  lines  over  and  over  to  the 
complete  tune.  She  arranged  the  meal  and  went  to  the 
door  and  called  Luster,  and  after  a  time  Luster  and  Ben 


THE     SOUND     ANB     THE     FZJBY        31/ 

entered.  Ben  was  still  moaning  a  little,  as  to  himself. 

T3e  aint  never  quit/*  Luster  said. 

*TTall  come  on  en  eat,"  Dilsey  said.  **Jason  aint  coming 
to  dinner/'  They  sat  down  at  the  table.  Ben  could  man* 
age  solid  food  pretty  well  for  himself,  though  even  now* 
with  cold  food  before  him,  Dilsey  tied  a  cloth  about  his 
neclc.  He  and  Luster  ate.  Dilsey  moved  about  the  kitchen* 
singing  the  two  lines  of  the  hymn  which  she  remembered. 
""Tall  kin  g'awn  en  eat,**  she  said,  "Jason  aint  comin 
home.** 

He  was  twenty  miles  away  at  that  time.  When  he  left 
the  house  he  drove  rapidly  to  town,  overreaching  the 
slow  sabbath  groups  and  the  peremptory  bells  along  the 
broken  air.  He  crossed  the  empty  square  and  turned  into 
a  narrow  street  that  was  abruptly  quieter  even  yet,  and 
stopped  before  a  frame  house  and  went  up  the  flower- 
bordered  walk  to  the  porch. 

Beyond  the  screen  door  people  were  talking.  As  he 
lifted  his  hand  to  knock  he  heard  steps,  so  he  withheld 
his  hand  until  a  big  man  in  black  broadcloth  trousers  and 
a  stiff-bosomed  white  shirt  without  collar  opened  the 
door.  He  had  vigorous  untidy  iron-grey  hair  and  his  grey 
eyes  were  round  and  shiny  like  a  little  boy's.  He  took 
Jason's  hand  and  drew  him  into  the  house,  still  shaking  it. 

"Coine  right  in,"  he  said,  "Come  right  in." 

"You  ready  to  go  now?"  Jason  said. 

"Walk  right  in,"  the  other  said,  propelling  him  by  the 
elbow  into  a  room  where  a  man  and  a  woman  sat.  "You 
know  Myrtle's  husband,  don't  you?  Jason  Compson, 
Vernon." 

"Yes/*  Jason  said.  He  did  not  even  look  at  the  man, 
and  as  the  sheriff  drew  a  chair  across  the  room  the  man 


3*8        THE     SOUND     AND     THE      FUBY 

**WeTl  go  out  so  you  can  talk.  Come  on,  Myrtle.'* 

**No,  no/*  the  sheriff  said,  "You  folks  keep  your  seat, 
I  reckon  It  aint  that  serious,  Jason?  Have  a  seat." 

*T11  tell  you  as  we  go  along/'  Jason  said.  "Get  your  hat 
and  coat/* 

*WeII  go  out,*  the  man  said,  rising. 

"Keep  your  seat/'  the  sheriff  said.  "Me  and  Jason  will 
go  out  on  the  porch." 

"You  get  your  hat  and  coat/'  Jason  said.  "They've 
already  got  a  twelve  hour  start."  The  sheriff  led  the  way 
back  to  the  porch.  A  man  and  a  woman  passing  spoke  to 
him.  He  responded  with  a  hearty  florid  gesture.  Bells 
were  still  ringing,  from  the  direction  of  the  section  known 
as  Nigger  Hollow.  "Get  your  hat,  Sheriff/'  Jason  said. 
The  sheriff  drew  up  two  chairs. 

"Have  a  seat  and  tell  me  what  the  trouble  is." 

"I  told  you  over  the  phone/'  Jason  said,  standing.  "I 
did  that  to  save  time.  Am  I  going  to  have  to  go  to  law  to 
compel  you  to  do  your  sworn  duty?" 

"You  sit  down  and  tell  me  about  it/'  the  sheriff  said. 
Til  take  care  of  you  all  right." 

"Care,  hell/'  Jason  said.  "Is  this  what  you  call  taking 
care  of  me?" 

"You're  the  one  that's  holding  us  up/'  the  sheriff  said. 
You  sit  down  and  tell  me  about  it." 

Jason  told  him,  his  sense  of  injury  and  impotence  feed- 
ing upon  its  own  sound,  so  that  after  a  time  he  forgot  his 
haste  in  the  violent  cumulation  of  his  self  justification  and 
his  outrage.  The  sheriff  watched  him  steadily  with  his 
cold  shiny  eyes. 

"But  you  dont  know  they  done  it/'  he  said.  "You  just 
think  so." 

"Dont  know?"  Jason  said.  'When  I  spent  two  damn 
days  chasing  her  through  alleys,  trying  to  keep  her  away 


THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FURY        319 

from  him,  after  I  told  her  what  I'd  do  to  her  If  I  ever 
caught  her  with  him,  and  you  say  I  clout  know  that  that 
little  b — " 

"Now,  then,"  the  sheriff  said,  "That'll  do.  That's 
enough  of  that"  He  looked  out  across  the  street,  his 
hands  in  his  pockets. 

"And  when  I  come  to  you,  a  commissioned  officer  of 
the  law,"  Jason  said. 

'That  show's  in  Mottson  this  week/*  the  sheriff  said. 

"Yes,"  Jason  said,  "And  if  I  could  find  a  law  officer  that 
gave  a  solitary  damn  about  protecting  the  people  that 
elected  him  to  office,  I'd  be  there  too  by  now."  He  re- 
peated his  story,  harshly  recapitulant,  seeming  to  get  an 
actual  pleasure  out  of  his  outrage  and  impotence.  Tlie 
sheriff  did  not  appear  to  be  listening  at  all. 

"Jason,"  he  said,  '"What  were  you  doing  with  three 
thousand  dollars  hid  in  the  house?" 

"What?"  Jason  said.  "That's  my  business  where  I  keep 
my  money.  Your  business  is  to  help  me  get  it  back.** 

"Did  your  mother  know  you  had  that  much  on  the 
place?" 

"Look  here,"  Jason  said,  "My  house  has  been  robbed. 
I  know  who  did  it  and  I  know  where  they  are.  I  come 
to  you  as  the  commissioned  officer  of  the  law,  and  I  aslc 
you  once  more,  are  you  going  to  make  any  effort  to  re- 
cover my  property,  or  not?'* 

"What  do  you  aim  to  do  with  that  girl,  if  you  catch 
them?" 

"Nothing,"  Jason  said,  "Not  anything.  I  wouldn't  lay 
my  hand  on  her.  The  bitch  that  cost  me  a  job,  the  one 
chance  I  ever  had  to  get  ahead,  that  killed  my  father  and 
is  shortening  my  mother's  life  every  day  and  made  my 
name  a  laughing  stock  in  the  town.  I  wont  do  anything 
to  her,"  he  said.  "Not  anything/' 


320        THE     SQU^B      AND     THE     FUBY 

^ou  drove  that  girl  into  running  off,  Jason/*  the 
sheriff  said. 

"How  I  conduct  my  family  is  no  business  of  yours," 
Jason  said.  "Are  you  going  to  help  me  or  not?" 

<cYou  drove  her  away  from  home,"  the  sheriff  said, 
"And  I  have  some  suspicions  about  who  that  money  be- 
longs to  that  I  dont  reckon  I'll  ever  know  for  certain." 

Jason  stood,  slowly  wringing  the  brim  of  his  hat  in  his 
hands.  He  said  quietly:  "You're  not  going  to  make  any 
effort  to  catch  them  for  mef* 

That's  not  any  of  my  business,  Jason.  If  you  had  any 
actual  proof,  I'd  have  to  act  But  without  that  I  dont 
figger  it's  any  of  my  business." 

That's  your  answer,  is  it?"  Jason  said.  'Think  well, 
now." 

That's  it,  Jason." 

"All  right,"  Jason  said.  He  put  his  hat  on.  "You'll  regret 
this.  I  wont  be  helpless.  This  is  not  Russia,  where  just 
because  he  wears  a  little  metal  badge,  a  man  is  immune 
to  law."  He  went  down  the  steps  and  got  in  his  car  and 
started  the  engine.  The  sheriff  watched  him  drive  away, 
turn,  and  rush  past  the  house  toward  town. 

The  bells  were  ringing  again,  high  in  the  scudding 
sunlight  in  bright  disorderly  tatters  of  sound.  He  stopped 
at  a  filling  station  and  had  his  tires  examined  and  the  tank 
filled. 

"Gwine  on  a  trip,  is  you?"  the  negro  asked  him.  He 
didn't  answer.  "Look  like  hit  gwine  fair  off,  after  all/* 
the  negro  said. 

"Fair  off,  hell/'  Jason  said,  "It'll  be  raining  like  hell  by 
twelve  oclock.'*  He  looked  at  the  sky,  thinking  about  rain* 
about  the  slick  clay  roads,  himself  stalled  somewhere 
miles  from  town.  He  thought  about  it  with  a  sort  of 
triumph,  of  the  fact  that  he  was  going  to  miss  dinner, 


THE     SOUXD     AXD     THE     FUllY 

that  by  starting  now  and  so  serving  his  compulsion  of 
haste,  he  would  be  at  the  greatest  possible  distance  from 
both  towns  when  noon  came.  It  seemed  to  him  that,  in 
this,  circumstance  was  giving  him  a  break,  so  he  said  to 
the  negro: 

"What  the  hell  are  you  doing?  Has  somebody  paid  you 
to  keep  this  car  standing  here  as  long  as  you  can?" 

"Dis  here  tf  aint  got  no  air  a-tall  in  hit,"  the  negro 
said. 

"Then  get  the  hell  away  from  there  and  let  me  have 
that  tube,"  Jason  said. 

"Hit  up  now/*  the  negro  said,  rising.  "You  kin  ride 
now." 

Jason  got  in  and  started  the  engine  and  drove  off.  He 
went  into  second  gear,  the  engine  spluttering  and  gasp- 
ing, and  he  raced  the  engine,  jamming  the  throttle  down 
and  snapping  the  choker  in  and  out  savagely.  "It's  goin 
to  rain,"  he  said,  "Get  me  half  way  there,  and  rain  like 
hell."  And  he  drove  on  out  of  the  bells  and  out  of  town, 
thinking  of  himself  slogging  through  the  mud,  hunting  a 
team.  "And  every  damn  one  of  them  will  be  at  church.** 
He  thought  how  he'd  find  a  church  at  last  and  take  a 
team  and  of  the  owner  coming  out,  shouting  at  him  and 
of  himself  striking  the  man  down,  "I'm  Jason  Compson. 
See  if  you  can  stop  me.  See  if  you  can  elect  a  man  to 
office  that  can  stop  me,"  he  said,  thinking  of  himself 
entering  the  courthouse  with  a  file  of  soldiers  and 
dragging  the  sheriff  out.  "Thinks  he  can  sit  with  his 
hands  folded  and  see  me  lose  my  job.  Ill  show  him  about 
jobs."  Of  his  niece  he  did  not  think  at  all,  nor  the  arbi- 
trary valuation  of  the  money.  Neither  of  them  had  had 
entity  or  individuality  for  him  for  ten  years;  together 
they  merely  symbolized  the  job  in  the  bank  of  which  ha 
had  been  deprived  before  he  ever  got  it. 


322        THE     SOUND     AND     THE     PXJRY 

The  air  brightened,  the  running  shadow  patches  were 
not  the  obverse,  and  it  seemed  to  him  that  the  fact  that 
the  day  was  clearing  was  another  cunning  stroke  on  the 
part  of  the  foe,  the  fresh  battle  toward  which  he  was 
carrying  ancient  wounds.  From  time  to  time  he  passed 
churches,  unpainted  frame  buildings  with  sheet  iron 
steeples,  surrounded  by  tethered  teams  and  shabby 
motorcars,  and  it  seemed  to  him  that  each  of  them  was  a 
picket-post  where  the  rear  guards  of  Circumstance 
peeped  fleetingly  back  at  him.  "And  damn  You,  too/'  he 
said,  "See  if  You  can  stop  me,"  thinking  of  himself,  his 
file  of  soldiers  with  the  manacled  sheriff  in  the  rear, 
dragging  Omnipotence  down  from  His  throne,  if  neces- 
sary; of  the  embattled  legions  of  both  hell  and  heaven 
through  which  he  tore  his  way  and  put  his  hands  at  last 
©n  his  fleeing  niece. 

The  wind  was  out  of  the  southeast.  It  blew  steadily 
upon  his  cheek.  It  seemed  that  he  could  feel  the  pro- 
longed blow  of  it  sinking  through  his  skull,  and  suddenly 
with  an  old  premonition  he  clapped  the  brakes  on  and 
stopped  and  sat  perfectly  still.  Then  he  lifted  his  hand 
to  his  neck  and  began  to  curse,  and  sat  there,  cursing  in 
a  harsh,  whisper.  When  it  was  necessary  for  him  to  drive 
for  any  length  of  time  he  fortified  himself  with  a  hand- 
kerchief soaked  in  camphor,  which  he  would  tie  about 
his  throat  when  clear  of  town,  thus  inhaling  the  fumes, 
and  he  got  out  and  lifted  the  seat  cushion  on  the  chance 
that  there  might  be  a  forgotten  one  there.  He  looked 
beneath  both  seats  and  stood  again  for  a  while,  cursing, 
seeing  himself  mocked  by  his  own  triumphing.  He  closed 
his  eyes,  leaning  on  the  door.  He  could  return  and  get 
the  forgotten  camphor,  or  he  could  go  on.  In  either  case, 
his  head  would  be  splitting,  but  at  home  he  could  be 
sure  of  finding  camphor  on  Sunday,  while  if  he  went  on 


THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FTTEY 

lie  could  not  be  sure.  But  if  he  went  back,  he  would  be 
an  hour  and  a  half  later  in  reaching  Mottson.  "Maybe  \ 
can  drive  slow/'  he  sad.  "M aybe  I  can  drive  slow,  think- 
ing of  something  else — ** 

He  got  in  and  started.  Til  think  of  something  eke," 
he  said,  so  he  thought  about  Lorraine.  He  imagined  him- 
self in  bed  with  her,  only  he  was  just  lying  beside  her, 
pleading  with  her  to  help  him,  then  he  thought  of  the 
money  again,  and  that  he  had  been  outwitted  by  a 
woman,  a  girl.  If  he  could  just  believe  it  was  the  inan  who 
had  robbed  him.  But  to  have  been  robbed  of  that  which 
was  to  have  compensated  him  for  the  lost  job,  which  he 
had  acquired  through  so  much  effort  and  risk,  by  the 
very  symbol  of  the  lost  job  itself,  and  worst  of  all,  "by  a 
bitch  of  a  girl.  He  drove  on,  shielding  his  face  from  the 
steady  wind  with  the  corner  of  his  coat. 

He  could  see  the  opposed  forces  of  his  destiny  and  his 
will  drawing  swiftly  together  now,  toward  a  junction 
that  would  be  irrevocable;  he  became  cunning.  I  cant 
make  a  blunder,  he  told  himself.  There  would  be  just 
one  right  thing,  without  alternatives:  he  must  do  that 
He  believed  that  both  of  them  would  know  him  on  sight, 
while  he'd  have  to  trust  to  seeing  her  first,  unless  the 
man  still  wore  the  red  tie.  And  the  fact  that  he  must  de- 
pend on  that  red  tie  seemed  to  be  the  sum  of  the  impend- 
ing disaster;  he  could  almost  smell  it,  feel  it  above  the 
throbbing  of  his  head. 

He  crested  the  final  hill.  Smoke  lay  in  the  valley,  and 
roofs,  a  spire  or  two  above  trees.  He  drove  down  the  hill 
and  into  the  town,  slowing,  telling  himself  again  of  the 
need  for  caution,  to  find  where  the  tent  was  located  first. 
He  could  not  see  very  well  now,  and  he  knew  that  it  was 
the  disaster  which  kept  telling  him  to  go  directly  and  get 
something  for  his  head.  At  a  filling  station  they  told  him 


3*4        THE      SOTJXD     AND     THE     FURY 

that  the  tent  was  not  up  yet,  but  that  the  show  cars  were 
on  a  siding  at  the  station.  He  drove  there. 

Two  gaudily  painted  pullrnan  cars  stood  on  the  track. 
He  reconnoitred  them  before  he  got  out.  He  was  trying 
to  breathe  shailowly,  so  that  the  blood  would  not  beat 
so  In  his  skull.  He  got  out  and  went  along  the  station 
wall,  watching  the  ears.  A  few  garments  hung  out  of 
the  windows,  limp  and  crinkled,,  as  though  they  had  been 
recently  laundered.  On  the  earth  beside  the  steps  of 
one  sat  three  canvas  chairs.  But  he  saw  no  sign  of  life 
at  all  until  a  man  In  a  -dirty  apron  came  to  the  door  and 
emptied  a  pan  of  dishwater  with  a  broad  gesture,  the 
sunlight  glinting  on  the  metal  belly  of  the  pan,  then 
entered  the  car  again. 

Now  111  have  to  take  him  by  surprise,  before  he  can 
warn  them,  he  thought.  It  never  occurred  to  him  that 
they  might  not  be  there,  In  the  car.  That  they  should  not 
be  there,  that  the  whole  result  should  not  hinge  on 
whether  he  saw  them  first  or  they  saw  him  first,  would 
be  opposed  to  all  nature  and  contrary  to  the  whole 
rhythm  of  events.  And  more  than  that:  he  must  see  them 
first,  get  the  money  back,  then  what  they  did  would  be  of 
no  importance  to  him,  while  otherwise  the  whole  world 
would  know  that  he,  Jason  Compson,  had  been  robbed 
by  Quentin,  his  niece,  a  bitch. 

He  reconnoitred  again.  Then  he  went  to  the  car  and 
mounted  the  steps,  swiftly  and  quietly,  and  paused  at 
the  door.  The  galley  was  dark,  rank  with  stale  food.  The 
man  was  a  white  blur,  singing  in  a  cracked,  shaky  tenor. 
An  old  man,  he  thought,  and  not  as  big  as  I  am.  He 
entered  the  car  as  the  man  looked  up. 

"Hey?"  the  man  said,  stopping  his  song. 

'Where  are  they?"  Jason  said.  "Quick,  now.  In  tke 
sleeping  car?" 


THE     SOUNB     AND     THE 

"Where's  who?"  the  man  said. 

"Dont  He  to  me,"  Jason  said.  He  blundered  on  in  the 
cluttered  obscurity. 

"What's  that?"  the  other  said,  "Who  you  calling  a  liar?" 
And  when  Jason  grasped  his  shoulder  he  exclaimed, 
"Look  out,  fellow!" 

"Dont  lie/5  Jason  said,  "Where  are  they?'* 

"Why,  you  bastard/'  the  man  said.  His  arm  was  frail 
and  thin  in  Jason's  grasp.  He  tried  to  wrench  free,  then 
he  turned  and  fell  to  scrabbling  on  the  littered  table 
behind  him. 

"Come  on,"  Jason  said,  'Where  are  they?" 

"I'll  tell  you  where  they  are/'  the  man  shrieked, 
"Lemme  find  my  butcher  knife." 

"Here/'  Jason  said,  trying  to  hold  the  other.  Tin  just 
asking  you  a  question." 

"You  bastard,"  the  other  shrieked,  scrabbling  at  the 
table.  Jason  tried  to  grasp  him  in  both  arms,  trying  to 
prison  the  puny  fury  of  him.  The  man's  body  felt  so  old, 
tso  frail,  yet  so  fatally  single-purposed  that  for  the  first 
time  Jason  saw  clear  and  unshadowed  the  disaster  toward 
which  he  rushed. 

"Quit  it!"  he  said,  "Here!  Here!  Ill  get  out.  Give  me 
time,  and  I'll  get  out." 

"Call  me  a  liar/'  the  other  wailed,  "Lemme  go.  Leixime 
go  just  one  minute.  I'll  show  you." 

Jason  glared  wildly  about,  holding  the  other.  Outside 
it  was  now  bright  and  sunny,  swift  and  bright  and  empty, 
and  he  thought  of  the  people  soon  to  be  going  quietly 
home  to  Sunday  dinner,  decorously  festive,  and  of  him- 
self trying  to  hold  the  fatal,  furious  little  old  man  whom 
he  dared  not  release  long  enough  to  turn  his  back  and 
run. 

"Will  you  quit  long  enough  for  me  to  get  out?"  he 


THE      SOUND      AND      THE      FU  BY 

said,  "Will  you?"  But  the  other  still  struggled,  and  Jason 
freed  one  hand  and  struck  him  on  the  head.  A  clumsy, 
hurried  blow,  and  not  hard,  but  the  other  slumped  im- 
mediately and  slid  clattering  among  pans  and  buckets 
to  the  floor.  Jason  stood  above  him,  panting,  listening. 
Then  he  turned  and  ran  from  the  car.  At  the  door  he 
restrained  himself  and  descended  more  slowly  and  stood 
there  again.  His  breath  made  a  hah  hah  hah  sound  and 
he  stood  there  trying  to  repress  it,  darting  his  gaze  this 
way  and  that,  when  at  a  scuffling  sound  behind  him  he 
turned  in  time  to  see  the  little  old  man  leaping  awk- 
wardly and  furiously  from  the  vestibule,  a  rusty  hatchet 
high  in  his  hand. 

He  grasped  at  the  hatchet,  feeling  no  shock  but  know- 
ing that  he  was  falling,  thinking  So  this  is  how  itll  end, 
and  he  believed  that  he  was  about  to  die  and  when 
something  crashed  against  the  back  of  his  head  he 
thought  How  did  he  hit  me  there?  Only  maybe  he  hit 
me  a  long  time  ago,  he  thought,  And  I  just  now  felt  it, 
and  he  thought  Hurry.  Hurry.  Get  it  over  with,  and  then 
a  furious  desire  not  to  die  seized  him  and  he  struggled., 
hearing  the  old  man  wailing  and  cursing  in  his  cracked 
voice. 

He  still  struggled  when  they  hauled  him  to  his  feet, 
but  they  held  him  and  he  ceased. 

"Am  I  bleeding  much?"  he  said,  "The  back  of  my 
head.  Am  I  bleeding?"  He  was  still  saying  that  while  he 
felt  himself  being  propelled  rapidly  away,  heard  the  old 
man's  thin  furious  voice  dying  away  behind  him.  "Look 
at  my  head/'  he  said,  "Wait,  I — " 

"Wait,  hell,"  the  man  who  held  him  said,  "That  damn 
little  wasp'll  kill  you.  Keep  going.  You  aint  hurt." 

"He  hit  me,"  Jason  said.  "Am  I  bleeding?" 

"Keep  going,"  the  other  said.  He  led  Jason  on  around 


THE     SOUND     AND     THK     FURY        3*7 

the  corner  of  the  station.,  to  the  empty  platform  where 
an  express  truck  stood,  where  grass  grew  rigidly  in  a  plot 
bordered  with  rigid  lowers  and  a  sign  in  electric  lights: 
Keep  your  eye  on  Mottson,  the  gap  filled  by 

an  eye  with  an  electric  pupil.  The  man  released 

him. 

"Now/'  he  said,  "You  get  on  out  of  here  and  stay  out 
What  were  you  trying  to  do?  Commit  suicide?" 

"I  was  looking  for  two  people/*  Jason  said.  **I  just 
asked  him  where  they  were." 

"Who  you  looking  for?" 

"It's  a  girl/'  Jason  said.  "And  a  man.  He  had  on  a  red  tie 
in  Jefferson  yesterday.  With  this  show.  They  robbed  me." 

"Oh/'  the  man  said.  "You're  the  one,  are  you.  Well, 
they  aint  here/' 

"I  reckon  so/'  Jason  said.  He  leaned  against  the  wall 
and  put  his  hand  to  the  back  of  his  head  and  looked  at 
his  palm.  "I  thought  I  was  bleeding/'  he  said.  "I  thought 
he  hit  me  with  that  hatchet/' 

"You  hit  your  head  on  the  rail/'  the  man  said.  Tou 
better  go  on.  They  aint  here." 

"Yes.  He  said  they  were  not  here.  I  thought  he  was 
lying." 

"Do  you  think  I'm  lying?"  the  man  said. 

"No/'  Jason  said.  "I  know  they're  not  here/' 

"I  told  him  to  get  the  hell  out  of  there,  both  of  them/' 
the  man  said.  "I  wont  have  nothing  like  that  in  my  show. 
I  run  a  respectable  show,  with  a  respectable  troupe/* 

"Yes/'  Jason  said.  "You  dont  know  where  they  went?" 

"No.  And  I  dont  want  to  know.  No  member  of  my  show 
can  pull  a  stunt  like  that.  You  her — brother?" 

"No/'  Jason  said.  "It  dont  matter.  I  just  wanted  to  see 
them.  You  sure  he  didn't  hit  me?  No  blood,  I  mean/* 

"There  would  have  be^n  blood  if  I  hadn't  got  there 


J28        THE     SOUXD      AKD     THE      FURY 

when  1  did.  You  stay  away  from  here,  now.  That  little 
bastard!!  kill  you.  That  your  car  yonder?" 

"Yes." 

"Well,  you  get  in  it  and  go  back  to  Jefferson.  If  you 
find  them,  it  wont  be  in  my  show.  I  run  a  respectable 
show.  You  say  they  robbed  you?" 

"No/*  Jason  said,  "It  dont  make  any  difference."  He 
went  to  the  car  and  got  in.  What  is  it  I  must  do?  he 
thought.  Then  he  remembered.  He  started  the  engine  and 
drove  slowly  up  the  street  until  he  found  a  drugstore.  The 
door  was  locked.  He  stood  for  a  while  with  his  hand  on 
the  knob  and  his  head  bent  a  little.  Then  he  turned  away 
and  when  a  man  came  along  after  a  while  he  asked  if 
there  was  a  drugstore  open  anywhere,  but  there  was  not. 
Then  he  asked  when  the  northbound  train  ran,  and  the 
man  told  him  at  two  thirty.  He  crossed  the  pavement  and 
got  in  the  car  again  and  sat  there.  After  a  while  two 
negro  lads  passed.  He  called  to  them. 

"Can  either  of  you  boys  drive  a  car?" 

"Yes,  suk" 

"Whatll  you  charge  to  drive  me  to  Jefferson  right 
away?" 

They  looked  at  one  another,  murmuring. 

*TI1  pay  a  dollar,"  Jason  said. 

They  murmured  again.  "Couldn't  go  fer  dat,"  one  said. 

"What  will  you  go  for?" 

<£Kin  you  go?"  one  said. 

"I  cant  git  off,"  the  other  said.  "Whyn't  you  drive  him 
up  dar?  You  aint  got  nothin  to  do." 

"Yes  I  is." 

"Whut  you  got  to  do?" 

They  murmured  again,  laughing. 

*TU  give  you  two  dollars,"  Jason  said.  "Either  of  you.*9 

"I  cant  git  away  neither,"  the  first  said. 


THE     SOUISTD     ANB     THE     FUBT        329 

"All  right;'  Jason  said.  "Go  on" 

He  sat  there  for  sometime.  He  heard  a  clock  strike  the 
half  hour,  then  people  began  to  pass,  in  Sunday  and 
Easter  clothes.  Some  looked  at  him  as  they  passed,  at 
the  man  sitting  quietly  behind  the  wheel  of  a  small  car, 
with  his  invisible  life  ravelled  out  about  him  like  a  worn- 
out  sock.  After  a  while  a  negro  in  overalls  came  up. 

"Is  you  de  one  wants  to  go  to  Jefferson?"  he  said. 

"Yes/'  Jason  said.  "Whatll  you  charge  me?" 

"Fo  dollars." 

"Give  you  two/* 

"Cant  go  fer  no  less'n  fo."  The  man  in  the  car  sat 
quietly.  He  wasn't  even  looking  at  him.  The  negro  said^ 
*Tou  want  me  er  not?" 

"All  right/'  Jason  said,  "Get  in/' 

He  moved  over  and  the  negro  took  the  wheel.  Jason 
closed  his  eyes.  I  can  get  something  for  it  at  Jefferson, 
he  told  himself,  easing  himself  to  the  jolting,  I  can  get 
something  there.  They  drove  on>  along  the  streets  where 
people  were  turning  peacefully  into  houses  and  Sunday 
dinners,  and  on  out  of  town.  He  thought  that.  He  wasn't 
thinking  of  home,  where  Ben  and  Luster  were  eating 
cold  dinner  at  the  kitchen  table.  Something — the  absence 
of  disaster,  threat,  in  any  constant  evil — permitted  him 
to  forget  Jefferson  as  any  place  which  he  had  ever  seen 
before,  where  his  life  must  resume  itself. 

When  Ben  and  Luster  were  done  Dilsey  sent  them 
outdoors.  "And  see  kin  you  keep  let  him  alone  twell  fo 
oclock.  T.  P.  be  here  den/* 

"Yessum,"  Luster  said.  They  went  out.  Dilsey  ate  her 
dinner  and  cleared  up  the  kitchen.  Then  she  went  to  the 
foot  of  the  stairs  and  listened,  but  there  was  no  sound. 
She  returned  through  the  kitchen  and  out  the  outer  door 
and  stopped  on  the  steps.  Ben  and  Luster  were  not  in 


33°        THE      SOUXD      AXD     TBtB 

sight,  but  while  she  stood  there  she  heard  another  slug- 
gish twang  from  the  direction  of  the  cellar  door  and  she 
went  to  the  door  and  looked  down  upon  a  repetition  of 
the  morning's  scene. 

"He  done  it  jes  dat  way/*  Luster  said.  He  contemplated 
the  motionless  saw  with  a  kind  of  hopeful  dejection.  "I 
aint  got  de  right  thing  to  hit  it  wid  yit,"  he  said. 

"En  you  aint  gwine  find  hit  down  here,  neither,*'  Dilsey 
s&id,  Tou  take  him  on  out  in  de  sun.  You  bofe  get 
pneumonia  down  here  on  dis  wet  flo/' 

She  waited  and  watched  them  cross  the  yard  toward 
a  clump  of  cedar  trees  near  the  fence.  Then  she  went  on 
to  her  cabin. 

"Now,  dont  you  git  started/"  Luster  said,  "I  had  enough 
trouble  wid  you  today/'  There  was  a  hammock  made  of 
barrel  staves  slatted  into  woven  wires.  Luster  lay  down 
in  the  swing,  but  Ben  went  on  vaguely  and  purposelessly. 
He  began  to  whimper  again.  "Hush,  now/'  Luster  said, 
"I  fixin  to  whup  you."  He  lay  back  in  the  swing.  Ben  had 
stopped  moving,  but  Luster  could  hear  him  whimpering. 
"Is  you  gwine  hush,  er  aint  you?"  Luster  said.  He  got  up 
and  followed  and  came  upon  Ben  squatting  before  a 
small  mound  of  earth.  At  either  end  of  it  an  empty  bottle 
of  blue  glass  that  once  contained  poison  was  fixed  in  the 
ground.  In  one  was  a  withered  stalk  of  jimson  weed.  Ben 
squatted  before  it,  moaning,  a  slow,  inarticulate  sound. 
Still  moaning  he  sought  vaguely  about  and  found  a  twig 
and  put  it  in  the  other  bottle.  "Whyn't  you  hush?"  Luster 
said,  "You  want  me  to  give  you  somethin'  to  sho  nough 
moan  about?  Sposin  I  does  dis."  He  knelt  and  swept  the 
bottle  suddenly  up  and  behind  him.  Ben  ceased  moaning. 
He  squatted,  looking  at  the  small  depression  where  the 
bottle  had  sat,  then  as  he  drew  his  lungs  full  Luster 
brought  the  bottle  back  into  view.  "Hush!"  he  hissed, 


THE     SOUND     ANB     THE     FUEY        331 

TDont  you  dast  to  beller!  Dont  you.  Dar  hit  is.  See?  Here. 
You  fixin  to  start  ef  you  stays  here.  Come  on,  les  go  see 
ef  dey  started  knocMn  ball  yit."  He  took  Ben's  arm  and 
drew  him  up  and  they  went  to  the  fence  and  stood  side 
by  side  there,  peering  between  the  matted  honeysuckle 
not  yet  in  bloom. 

TDar,"  Luster  said,  ""Dar  come  some.  See  urn?" 

They  watched  the  foursome  play  onto  the  green  and 
out;  and  move  to  the  tee  and  drive.  Ben  watched,  whim- 
pering, slobbering.  When  the  foursome  went  on  he  fol- 
lowed along  the  fence,  bobbing  and  moaning.  One  saia. 

"Here,  caddie.  Bring  the  bag/* 

"Hush,  Benjy,"  Luster  said,  but  Ben  went  on  at  his 
shambling  trot,  clinging  to  the  fence,  wailing  in  his 
hoarse,  hopeless  voice.  The  man  played  and  went  on, 
Ben  keeping  pace  with  him  until  the  fence  turned  at 
right  angles,  and  he  clung  to  the  fence,  watching  the 
people  move  on  and  away. 

"Will  you  hush  now?w  Luster  said,  "Will  you  hush 
now?"  He  shook  Ben's  arm.  Ben  clung  to  the  fence, 
wailing  steadily  and  hoarsely.  "Aint  you  gwine  stop?" 
Luster  said,  "Or  is  you?"  Ben  gazed  through  the  fence. 
*AH  right,  den,"  Luster  said,  "You  want  somethin  to 
beller  about?"  He  looked  over  his  shoulder,  toward  the 
house.  Then  he  whispered:  "Caddy!  Beller  now.  Caddy! 
Caddy!  Caddy!" 

A  moment  later,  in  the  slow  intervals  of  Ben's  voice, 
Luster  heard  Dilsey  calling.  He  took  Ben  by  the  arm  and 
they  crossed  the  yard  toward  her. 

*1  tole  you  he  wam't  gwine  stay  quiet,"  Luster  said. 

**You  vilyun!"  Dilsey  said,  "Whut  you  dont  to  him?" 

T[  aint  done  nothin.  I  tole  you  when  dem  folks  start 
playin,  he  git  started  up.9* 

*TTou  come  an  here,"  Dilsey  said.  "Hush,  Benjy.  Hush, 


532        THB     SOUXD     AND     THE     FXJXY 

now.**  But  lie  wouldn't  hush.  They  crossed  the  yard 
quickly  and  went  to  the  cabin  and  entered.  "Run  git  dat 
shoe,3*  Dilsey  said.  "Dont  you  sturb  Miss  Cahline,  now. 
Ef  she  say  anything,  tell  her  I  got  him.  Go  on,  now;  you 
kin  sho  do  dat  right,  I  reckon."  Luster  went  out.  Dilsey 
led  Ben  to  the  bed  and  drew  him  down  beside  her  and 
she  held  him,  rocking  back  and  forth,  wiping  his  drooling 
mouth  upon  the  hem  of  her  skirt.  "Hush,  now,"  she  said, 
stroking  his  head,  "Hush.  Dilsey  got  you/*  But  he  bel- 
lowed slowly,  abjectly,  without  tears;  lie  grave  hopeless 
sound  of  all  voiceless  misery  under  the  sun.  Luster  re- 
turned, carrying  a  white  satin  slipper.  It  was  yellow  now, 
and  cracked  and  soiled,  and  when  they  placed  it  into 
Ben's  hand  he  hushed  for  a  while.  But  he  still  whimpered, 
and  soon  he  lifted  his  voice  again. 

"You  reckon  you  kin  find  T.  R?"  Dilsey  said. 

**He  say  yistiddy  he  gwine yout  to  St  John's  today.  Say 
he  be  back  at  fo/'  / 

Dilsey  rocked  back  and  forth,  stroking  Ben's  head. 

TDis  long  time,  O  Jesus,"  she  said,  TDis  long  time/* 

"I  kin  drive  dat  surrey,  mammy/'  Luster  said. 

"You  kill  bofe  /all,"  Dilsey  said,  "You  do  hit  fer  devil- 
ment. I  knows  you  got  plenty  sense  to.  But  I  cant  trust 
you.  Hush,  now/*  she  said.  "HusBu  Hush/* 

"Nome  I  wont/"  Luster  said.  "I  drives  wid  T.  P."  Dil- 
sey rocked  back  and  forth,  holding  Ben,  "Miss  Cahline 
say  ef  you  cant  quiet  him,  she  gwine  git  up  en  come 
down  en  do  hit/' 

"Hush,  honey/*  Dilsey  said.,  stroking  Ben's  head.  ""Lus- 
ter, honey/*  she  said,  <cWill  you  think  about  yo  ole 
mammy  en  drive  dat  surrey  right?" 

<tfYessum/'  Luster  said.  "I  drive  hit  jes  like  T.  P." 

Dilsey  stroked  Ben's  head,  rocking  back  and  forth. 
T[  does  de  bes  I  kin/7  she  said,  TLawd  knows  dat.  Go 


THE     SOUND     A^B     THE     FUILT        333 

git  it,  den,**  she  said,  rising.  Luster  scuttled  out.  Ben  held 
the  slipper,  crying.  "Hush,  now.  Luster  gone  to  git  de 
surrey  en  take  you  to  de  graveyard.  We  aint  gwine  risk 
gitting  yo  cap/'  she  said.  She  went  to  a  closet  con- 
trived of  a  calico  curtain  hung  across  a  corner  of  the  room 
and  got  the  felt  hat  she  had  worn.  **We*s  down  to  worse's 
dis,  ef  folks  jes  knowed/*  she  said.  **You*s  de  Lawd's  chile, 
anyway.  En  I  be  His'n  too,  fo  long,  praise  Jesus.  Here.** 
She  put  the  hat  on  his  head  and  buttoned  his  coat.  He 
wailed  steadily.  She  took  the  slipper  from  him  and  put  it 
away  and  they  went  out.  Luster  came  up,  with  an  ancient 
white  horse  in  a  battered  and  lopsided  surrey. 

*TTou  gwine  be  careful.  Luster?'*  she  said. 

**Yessum/*  Luster  said.  She  helped  Ben  into  the  back 
seat.  He  had  ceased  crying,  but  now  he  began  to  whim- 
per  again. 

"Hit's  his  flower,"  Luster  said.  "Wait,  111  git  him  one/* 

*Tou  set  right  dar/'  Dilsey  said.  She  went  and  took  the 
cheekstxap.  "Now,  hurry  en  git  him  one.**  Luster  ran 
around  the  house,  toward  the  garden.  He  came  back  with 
a  single  narcissus. 

"Dat  un  broke/*  Dilsey  said,  "Whyn't  you  git  him  3 
good  un?" 

**Hit  de  onliest  one  I  could  find/'  Luster  said*  *YaII 
took  all  of  um  Friday  to  dec'rate  de  church.  Wait,  I'll  621 
hit/*  So  while  Dilsey  held  the  horse  Luster  put  a  splint 
on  the  flower  stalk  with  a  twig  and  two  bits  of  string 
and  gave  it  to  Ben.  Then  he  mounted  and  took  the  reins* 
Dilsey  still  held  the  bridle. 

*TTou  knows  de  way  now?9*  she  said,  "Up  de  street, 
round  de  square,  to  de  graveyard,  den  straight  badh 
home/* 

Tessum/*  Luster  said,  TKurn  up,  Queenie/* 
gwine  be  careful,  now?'* 


334        THE     SOITKB     A3STB     THE 

"Yessran.**  Dllsey  released  the  bridle. 

wHum  up?  Queenie/'  Luster  said. 

"Here,"  Dilsey  said,  "You  ban  me  dat  wimp/* 

"Aw,  mammy/5  Luster  said. 

wGive  hit  here/'  Dilsey  said,  approaching  the  wheel. 
lister  gave  it  to  her  reluctantly. 

"I  wont  never  git  Queenie  started  now." 

"Never  you  mind  about  dat/*  Dilsey  said.  "Queenie 
IQQ.OW  mo  bout  whar  she  gwine  clan  you  does.  All  you 
got  to  do  is  set  dar  en  hold  dem  reins.  You  knows  de 
way,  now?" 

"Yessum.  Same  way  T.  P.  goes  ev'y  Sunday.** 

"Den  you  do  de  same  thing  dis  Sunday." 

"Cose  I  is.  Aint  I  drove  fer  T,  P.  mo'n  a  hund'ed  times?" 

"Den  do  hit  again/'  Dilsey  said.  "G'awn,  now.  En  ef 
you  hurts  Benjy,  nigger  boy,  I  dont  know  whut  I  do. 
You  bound  fer  de  chain  gang,  but  I'll  send  you  dar  fo 
even  chain  gang  ready  fer  you." 

"Yessum/*  Luster  said.  "Hum  up,  Queenie/' 

He  flapped  the  lines  on  Queenie's  broad  back  and  the 
surrey  lurched  into  motion. 

"You,  Luster!"  Dilsey  said. 

xHum  up,  darl"  Luster  said.  He  flapped  the  lines  again. 
With  subterranean  rumblings  Queenie  jogged  slowly 
down  the  drive  and  turned  into  the  street,  where  Luster 
exhorted  her  into  a  gait  resembling  a  prolonged  and  sus- 
pended fall  in  a  forward  direction. 

Ben  quit  whimpering.  He  sat  in  the  middle  of  the  seat, 
holding  the  repaired  flower  upright  in  his  fist,  his  eyes 
serene  and  ineffable.  Directly  before  him  Luster's  bullet 
head  turned  backward  continually  until  the  house  passed 
from  view,  then  he  pulled  to  the  side  of  the  street  and 
while  Ben  watched  him  he  descended  and  broke  a  switch 
from  a  hedge.  Queenie  lowered  her  head  and  fell  to 


THE     SOUND     AND     THE     FXJBY        3$Jf 

cropping  the  grass  until  Luster  mounted  and  hauled  her 
head  up  and  harried  her  into  motion  again,  then  he 
squared  his  elbows  and  with  the  switch  and  the  reins 
held  high  he  assumed  a  swaggering  attitude  out  of  all 
proportion  to  the  sedate  clopping  of  Queenie's  hooves 
and  the  organlike  basso  of  her  internal  accompaniment. 
Motors  passed  them,  and  pedestrians;  once  a  group  ol 
half  grown  negroes: 

"Dar  Luster.  Whar  you  gwine,  Luster?  To  de  bone- 
yard?" 

"Hi/*  Luster  said,  "Aint  de  same  boneyard  y*aH  headed 
fer.  Hum  up,  elefump/* 

They  approached  the  square,  where  the  Confederate 
soldier  gazed  with  empty  eyes  beneath  his  marble  hand 
into  wind  and  weather.  Luster  took  still  another  notch 
in  himself  and  gave  the  impervious  Queenie  a  cut  with 
the  switch,  casting  his  glance  about  the  square.  TDar  Mr 
Jason's  car/'  he  said  then  he  spied  another  group  of 
negroes.  "Les  show  dem  niggers  how  quality  does, 
Benjy,"  he  said,  **Whut  you  say?"  He  looked  back,  Ben 
sat,  holding  the  flower  in  his  fist,  Ms  gaze  empty  and  un- 
troubled. Luster  hit  Queenie  again  and  swung  her  to  the 
left  at  the  monument. 

For  an  instant  Ben  sat  in  an  utter  hiatus.  Then  he 
bellowed.  Bellow  on  bellow,  his  voice  mounted,  with 
scarce  interval  for  breath.  There  was  more  than  astonish- 
ment in  it,  it  was  horror;  shock;  agony  eyeless,  tongue-* 
less;  just  sound,  and  Luster's  eyes  back-rolling  for  a  white 
instant.  "Gret  God,"  he  said,  "Hush!  Hush!  Gret  God!" 
He  whirled  again  and  struck  Queenie  with  the  switch.  It 
broke  and  he  cast  it  away  and  with  Ben's  voice  mounting 
toward  its  unbelievable  crescendo  Luster  caught  up  the 
end  of  the  reins  and  leaned  forward  as  Jason  came  jump- 
ing across  the  square  and  onto  the  step. 


THE      SOUND      AX»     THE      FTJBY 

With  a  backhanded  blow  he  hurled  Luster  aside  and 
caught  the  reins  and  sawed  Queenie  about  and  doubled 
the  reins  back  and  slashed  her  across  the  hips.  He  cut 
her  again,  and  again,  into  a  plunging  gallop,  while  Ben's 
hoarse  agony  roared  about  them,  and  swung  her  about 
to  the  right  of  the  monument.  They  he  struck  Luster  over 
the  head  with  his  fist, 

*T)ont  you  know  any  better  than  to  take  him  to  the 
left?"  he  said.  He  reached  back  and  struck  Ben,  breaking 
the  flower  stalk  again.  "Shut  up!"  he  said,  "Shut  up!"  He 
jerked  Queenie  back  and  jumped  down.  "Get  to  hell  on 
home  with  him.  If  you  ever  cross  that  gate  with  him 
again,  111  kill  youl" 

*Yes,  suhP  Luster  said.  He  took  the  reins  and  hit 
Queenie  with  the  end  of  them.  "Git  up!  Git  up,  darl 
Benjy,  fer  God's  sake!" 

Ben's  voice  roared  and  roared.  Queenie  moved  again, 
her  feet  began  to  clop-clop  steadily  again,  and  at  once 
Ben  hushed.  Luster  looked  quickly  back  over  his  shoul- 
der, then  he  drove  on.  The  broken  flower  drooped  over 
Ben's  fist  and  his  eyes  were  empty  and  blue  and  serene 
again  as  cornice  and  fagade  flowed,  smoothly  once  more 
from  left  to  right;  post  and  tree,  window  and  doorway, 
and  signboard,  each  in  its  ordered  place. 


As  I  Lay  Dying 


Jo  Hal  Smith 


DARL 


YEWEL  AND  i  COME  UP  FROM  THE  FIELD,  FOLLOWING  THE 
tJ  path  in  single  file.  Although  I  am  fifteen  feet  ahead  ol 
Mm,  anyone  watching  us  from  the  cotton-house  can  see 
Jewel's  frayed  and  broken  straw  hat  a  full  head  above 
my  own. 

The  path  runs  straight  as  a  plumb-line,  worn  smooth 
by  feet  and  baked  brick-hard  by  July,  between  the  green 
rows  of  laid-by  cotton,  to  the  cotton-house  in  the  centre 
of  the  field,  where  it  turns  and  circles  the  cotton-house  at 
four  soft  right  angles  and  goes  on  across  the  field  again, 
worn  so  by  feet  in  fading  precision. 

The  cotton-house  is  of  rough  logs,  from  between  which 
the  chinking  has  long  fallen.  Square,  with  a  broken  roof 
set  at  a  single  pitch,  it  leans  in  empty  and  shimmering 
dilapidation  in  the  sunlight,  a  single  broad  window  in 
two  opposite  walls  giving  on  to  the  approaches  of  flie 
path.  When  we  reach  it  I  turn  and  follow  the  path  which 
circles  the  house.  Jewel,  fifteen  feet  behind  me,  looking 
straight  ahead,  steps  in  a  single  stride  through  the  win- 
dow. Still  staring  straight  ahead,  his  pale  eyes  like  wood 
set  into  his  wooden  face,  he  crosses  the  floor  in  four 
strides  with  the  rigid  gravity  of  a  cigar-store  Indian 
dressed  in  patched  overalls  and  endued  with  life  from 
the  hips  down,  and  steps  in  a  single  stride  through  th© 
opposite  window  and  into  the  path  again  just  as  I  come 
around  the  corner.  In  single  file  and  five  feet  apart  and 
Jewel  now  in  front,  we  go  on  up  the  path  toward  th© 
foot  of  the  bluffi 

339 


34°  AS     I     LAY     BYIXG 

Tull's  wagon  stands  beside  the  spring,  hitched  to  the 
rail,  the  reins  wrapped  about  the  seat  stanchion.  In  the 
wagon-bed  are  two  chairs.  Jewel  stops  at  the  spring  and 
takes  the  gourd  from  the  willow  branch  and  drinks.  I 
pass  him  and  mount  the  path,  beginning  to  hear  Cash's 
saw. 

When,  I  reach  the  top  he  Las  quit  sawing.  Standing  in 
a  litter  of  chips,  he  is  fitting  two  of  the  boards  together, 
Between  the  shadow  spaces  they  are  yellow  as  gold,  like 
soft  gold,  bearing  on  their  flanks  in  smooth  undulations 
the  marks  of  the  adze  blade:  a  good  carpenter,  Cash  is. 
He  holds  the  two  planks  on  the  trestle,  fitted  along  the 
edges  in  a  quarter  of  the  finished  box.  lie  kneels  and 
squints  along  the  edge  of  them,  then  he  lowers  them  and 
takes  up  the  adze.  A  good  carpenter.  Addie  Bundren 
could  not  want  a  better  one,  a  better  box  to  lie  in.  It  will 
give  her  confidence  and  comfort.  I  go  on  to  the  house, 
followed  by  the 

Chuck  Chuck  Chuck 

of  tile  adze. 


CORA 


SO  I  SAVED   OUT  THE   EGGS   AND   BAKED   YESTERDAY.    THE 
cakes  turned  out  right  well.  We  depend  a  lot  on  our 
chickens.  They  are  good  layers,  what  few  we  have  left 
after  the  possums  and  such.  Snakes,  too,  in  the  summer, 
A  snake  will  break  up  a  hen-house  quicker  than  any- 


AS     I     I,  AT     DYING  341 

thing.  So  after  they  were  going  to  cost  so  much  more 
than  Mr.  Tiill  thought,  and  after  1  promised  that  the  dif- 
ference In  the  number  of  eggs  would  make  it  up,  I  had 
to  be  more  careful  than  ever  because  it  was  on  my  final 
say-so  we  took  them.  We  could  have  stocked  cheaper 
chickens,  but  I  gave  my  promise  as  Miss  Lawingtou  said 
when  she  advised  me  to  get  a  good  breed,  because  Mr. 
Tull  himself  admits  that  a  good  breed  of  cows  or  hogs 
pays  in  the  long  run.  So  when  we  lost  so  many  of  them 
we  couldn't  aiford  to  use  the  eggs  ourselves,  because  I 
could  not  have  had  Mr.  Tull  chide  me  when  it  was  on 
my  say-so  we  took  them.  So  when  Miss  Lawington  told 
me  about  the  cakes  1  thought  that  I  could  bake  them 
and  earn  enough  at  one  time  to  increase  the  net  value  of 
the  flock  the  equivalent  of  two  head.  And  that  by  saving 
the  eggs  out  one  at  a  time,  even  the  eggs  wouldn't  be 
costing  anything.  And  that  week  they  laid  so  well  that 
I  not  only  saved  out  enough  eggs  above  what  we  had 
engaged  to  sell,  to  bake  the  cakes  with,  I  had  saved 
enough  so  that  the  flour  and  the  sugar  and  the  stove 
wood  would  not  be  costing  anything.  So  I  baked  yester- 
day, more  careful  than  ever  I  baked  in  my  life,  and  the 
cakes  turned  out  right  well.  But  when  we  got  to  town 
this  morning  Miss  Lawington  told  me  the  lady  had 
changed  her  mind  and  was  not  going  to  have  the  party 
after  all. 

"She  ought  to  taken  those  cakes  anyway/*  Kate  says. 

"Well/*  I  say,  "I  reckon  she  never  had  no  use  for  them 
now/* 

"She  ought  to  taken  them/*  Kate  says.  "But  those  rich 
town  ladies  can  change  their  minds.  Poor  folks  can't/* 

Riches  is  nothing  in  the  face  of  the  Lord,  for  He  can 
see  into  the  heart.  "Maybe  I  can  sell  them  at  the  bazaar 
Saturday/'  I  say.  They  turned  out  real  well* 


AS      I      JLAY      DYING 

"You  can't  get  two  dollars  a  piece  for  them/'  Kate  says, 

"Well,  it  isn't  like  they  cost  me  anything,"  I  say.  I 
saved  them  out  and  swapped  a  dozen  of  them  for  the 
sugar  and  flour.  It  isn't  like  the  cakes  cost  me  anything, 
as  Mr.  Tull  himself  realizes  that  the  eggs  I  saved  were 
over  and  beyond  what  we  had  engaged  to  sell,  so  it  was 
like  we  had  found  the  eggs  or  they  had  been  given  to 
us. 

"She  ought  to  taken  those  cakes  when  she  same  as 
gave  you  her  word,"  Kate  says.  The  Lord  can  see  into 
the  heart.  If  it  is  His  will  that  some  folks  has  different 
ideas  of  honesty  from  other  folks,  it  is  not  my  place  to 
question  His  decree. 

"1  reckon  she  never  had  any  use  for  them,"  I  say.  They 
turned  out  real  well,  too. 

The  quilt  is  drawn  up  to  her  chin,  hot  as  it  is,  with 
only  her  two  hands  and  her  face  outside.  She  is  propped 
on  the  pillow,  with  her  head  raised  so  she  can  see  out  the 
window,  and  we  can  hear  him  every  time  he  takes  up  the 
adze  or  the  saw.  If  we  were  deaf  we  could  almost  watch 
her  face  and  hear  him,  see  him.  Her  face  is  wasted  away 
so  that  the  bones  draw  just  under  the  skin  in  white  lines. 
Her  eyes  are  like  two  candles  when  you  watch  them 
gutter  down  into  the  sockets  of  iron  candle-sticks.  But 
the  eternal  and  the  everlasting  salvation  and  grace  is  not 
upon  her. 

'They  turned  out  real  nice,"  I  say.  *But  not  like  the 
cakes  Addie  used  to  bake."  You  can  see  that  girl's  wash- 
ing and  ironing  in  the  pillow-slip,  if  ironed  it  ever  was. 
Maybe  it  will  reveal  her  blindness  to  her,  laying  there 
at  the  mercy  and  the  ministration  of  four  men  and  a  tom- 
boy girl.  "There's  not  a  woman  in  this  section  could  ever 
bake  with  Addie  Bundren,"  I  say.  "First  thing  we  know 
shell  be  up  and  baking  again,  and  then  we  won't  haw 


AS     I     LAY     DYIJSTG  343 

any  sale  for  ours  at  all."  Under  the  quilt  she  makes  no 
more  of  a  hump  than  a  rail  would,  and  the  only  way  you 
can  tell  she  is  breathing  is  by  the  sound  of  the  mattress 
shucks.  Even  the  hair  at  her  cheek  does  not  move,  even 
with  that  girl  standing  right  over  her,  fanning  her  "with 
the  fan.  While  we  watch  she  swaps  the  fan  to  the  other 
hand  without  stopping  it. 

"Is  she  sleeping?"  Kate  whispers. 

"She's  just  watching  Cash  yonder/*  the  girl  says.  We 
can  hear  the  saw  in  the  board.  It  sounds  like  snoring. 
Eula  turns  on  the  trunk  and  looks  out  the  window.  Her 
necklace  looks  real  nice  with  her  red  hat.  You  wouldn't 
think  it  only  cost  twenty-five  cents. 

"She  ought  to  taken  those  cakes,**  Kate  says. 

I  could  have  used  the  money  real  well.  But  it's  not 
like  they  cost  me  anything  except  the  baking.  I  can  tell 
him  that  anybody  is  likely  to  make  a  miscue,  but  it's  not 
all  of  them  that  can  get  out  of  it  without  loss,  I  can  tell 
him.  It's  not  everybody  can  eat  their  mistakes,  I  can  tell 
him. 

Someone  cornes  through  the  hall.  It  is  DarL  He  does 
not  look  in  as  he  passes  the  door,  Eula  watches  him  as  he 
goes  on  and  passes  from  sight  again  toward  the  back. 
Her  hand  rises  and  touches  her  beads  lightly,  and  then 
her  hair.  When  she  finds  me  watching  her,  her  eyes  go 
blank. 


DARL 


PA  AND  YERNON  ARE  SITTING  ON  THE  BACK  POECH.  FA  IS 
tilting  snuff  from  the  lid  of  his  snuff-box  into  his  lower 
lip,  holding  the  lip  outdrawn  between  thumb  and  finger. 
They  look  around  as  I  cross  the  porch  and  dip  the  gourd 
into  the  water  bucket  and  drink. 

"Where's  Jewel?"  pa  says.  When  I  was  a  boy  I  first 
learned  how  much  better  water  tastes  when  it  has  set  a 
while  in  a  cedar  bucket.  Warmish-cooL  with  a  faint  taste 
like  the  hot  July  wind  in  cedar  trees  smells.  It  has  to  set 
at  least  six  hours,  and  be  drunk  from  a  gourd.  Water 
should  never  be  drunk  from  metal. 

And  at  night  it  is  better  still.  I  used  to  lie  on  the  pallet 
in  the  hall,  waiting  until  I  could  hear  them  all  asleep, 
so  I  could  get  up  and  go  back  to  the  bucket  It  would  be 
black,  the  shelf  black,  the  still  surface  of  the  water  a 
round  orifice  in  nothingness,  where  before  I  stirred  it 
awake  with  the  dipper  I  could  see  maybe  a  star  or  two 
in  the  bucket,  and  maybe  in  the  dipper  a  star  or  two 
before  I  drank.  After  that  I  was  bigger,  older.  Then  I 
would  wait  until  they  all  went  to  sleep  so  I  could  lie  with 
my  shirt-tail  up,  hearing  them  asleep,  feeling  myself 
without  touching  myself,  feeling  the  cool  silence  blowing 
upon  my  parts  and  wondering  if  Cash  was  yonder  in  the 
darkness  doing  it  too,  had  been  doing  it  perhaps  for  the 
last  two  years  before  I  could  have  wanted  to  or  could 
have. 

Pa's  feet  are  badly  splayed,  his  toes  cramped  and  bent 
and  warped,  with  no  toenail  at  all  on  his  little  toes,  from 


AS     I     LAY     DYING- 

working  so  hard  in  the  wet  in  homemade  shoes  when  he 
was  a  boy.  Beside  his  chair  his  brogans  sit.  They  look  as 
though  they  had  been  hacked  with  a  blunt  axe  out  of  pig- 
iron.  Veraon  has  been  to  town.  I  have  never  seen  him  go 
to  town  in  overalls.  His  wife5  they  say.  She  taught  school 
too,  once. 

I  fling  the  dipper  dregs  to  the  ground  and  wipe  my 
mouth  on  my  sleeve.  It  is  going  to  rain  before  morning. 
Maybe  before  dark  "Down  to  the  barn/*  I  say.  "Harness- 
ing the  team/* 

Down  there  fooling  with  that  horse.  He  will  go  en 
through  the  bam,  into  the  pasture.  The  horse  will  not  be 
in  sight:  he  is  up  there  among  the  pine  seedlings,  in  the 
cool.  Jewel  whistles,  once  and  shrill.  The  horse  snorts* 
then  Jewel  sees  him,  glinting  for  a  gaudy  instant  among 
the  blue  shadows.  Jewel  whistles  again;  the  horse  comes 
dropping  down  the  slope,  stiff-legged,  his  ears  cocking 
and  flicking,  his  mis-matched  eyes  rolling,  and  fetches  up 
twenty  feet  away,  broadside  on,  watching  Jewel  over  his 
shoulder  in  an  attitude  kittenish  and  alert. 

"Come  here,  sir/7  Jewel  says.  He  moves.  Moving  that 
quick  his  coat,  bunching,  tongues  swirling  like  so  many 
flames.  With  tossing  mane  and  tail  and  rolling  eye  the 
horse  makes  another  short  curveting  rush  and  stops  again, 
feet  bunched,  watching  Jewel.  Jewel  walks  steadily  to- 
ward him,  his  hands  at  his  sides.  Save  for  Jewel's  legs 
they  are  like  two  figures  carved  for  a  tableau  savage  in 
the  sun. 

When  Jewel  can  almost  touch  him,  the  horse  stands  on 
ids  hind  legs  and  slashes  down  at  Jewel,  Then  Jewel  is 
enclosed  by  a  glittering  maze  of  hooves  as  by  an  illusion 
of  wings;  among  them,  beneath  the  upreared  chest,  he 
moves  with  the  flashing  limbemess  of  a  snake.  For  an 
instant  before  the  jerk  comes  on  to  his  arms  he  sees  hi** 


AS      I     LAY      DYIXG 

whole  body  earth-free,  horizontal,  whipping  snake* 
limber,  until  he  finds  the  horse's  nostrils  and  touches 
earth  again.  Then  they  are  rigid,  motionless,  terrific,  the 
horse  back-thrust  on  stiffened,  quivering  legs,  with  low- 
3red  head;  Jewel  with  dug  heels,  shutting  off  the  horse's 
wind  with  one  hand,  with  the  other  patting  the  horse's 
neck  in  short  strokes  myriad  and  caressing,  cursing  the 
horse  with  obscene  ferocity. 

They  stand  in  rigid  terrific  hiatus,  the  horse  trembling 
and  groaning.  Then  Jewel  is  on  the  horse's  back.  He 
flows  upward  in  a  stooping  swirl  like  the  lash  of  a  whip, 
his  body  in  mid-air  shaped  to  the  horse.  For  another 
moment  the  horse  stands  spraddled,  with  lowered  head, 
before  it  bursts  into  motion.  They  descend  the  hill  ii>  ^ 
series  of  spine-jolting  jumps,  Jewel  high,  leech-like  on 
the  withers,  to  the  fence  where  the  horse  bunches  to  a 
scuttering  halt  again. 

"Well,"  Jewel  says,  "you  can  quit  now,  if  you  got 
a-plenty/' 

Inside  the  barn  Jewel  slides  running  to  the  ground 
before  the  horse  stops.  The  horse  enters  the  stall,  Jewel 
following.  Without  looking  back  the  horse  kicks  at  him, 
slamming  a  single  hoof  into  the  wall  with  a  pistol-like 
report.  Jewel  kicks  him  in  the  stomach;  the  horse  arches 
his  neck  back,  crop-toothed;  Jewel  strikes  him  across  the 
face  with  his  fist  and  slides  on  to  the  trough  and  mounts 
upon  it.  Clinging  to  the  hay-rack  he  lowers  his  head  and 
peers  out  across  the  stall  tops  and  through  the  doorway. 
The  path  is  empty;  from  here  he  cannot  even  hear  Cash 
sawing.  He  reaches  up  and  drags  down  hay  in  hurried 
fcimfuls  and  crams  it  into  the  rack. 

"Eat/*  he  says.  "Get  the  goddamn  stuff  out  of  sight 
While  you  got  a  chance,  you  pussel-gutted  bastard.  You 
Iweet  son  of  a  bitch,"  he  says. 


JEWEL 


1T*S  BECAUSE  HE  STAYS  OUT  THERE,  RIGHT  UNDER  THE  WD*» 
dow?  hammering  and  sawing  on  that  goddamn  box. 
Where  she's  got  to  see  him.  Where  every  breath  she 
iraws  is  full  of  his  knocking  and  sawing  where  she  can 
see  him  saying  See.  See  what  a  good  one  I  am  making  f  01 
you.  I  told  him  to  go  somewhere  else.  I  said  Good  Godi 
do  you  want  to  see  her  in  it.  It's  like  when  he  was  a  little 
boy  and  she  says  if  she  had  some  fertilizer  she  would  try 
to  raise  some  flowers  and  he  taken  the  bread-pan  and 
brought  it  back  from  the  bam  full  of  dung. 

And  now  them  others  sitting  there,  like  buzzards. 
Waiting,  fanning  themselves.  Because  I  said  If  you 
wouldn't  keep  on  sawing  and  nailing  at  it  until  a  man 
can't  sleep  even  and  her  hands  laying  on  the  quilt  like 
two  of  them  roots  dug  up  and  tried  to  wash  and  you 
couldn't  get  them  clean.  I  can  see  the  fan  and  Dewey 
DelFs  arm.  I  said  if  you'd  just  let  her  alone.  Sawing  and 
knocking,  and  keeping  the  air  always  moving  so  fast  on 
her  face  that  when  you're  tired  you  can't  breathe  it,  and 
that  goddamn  adze  going  One  lick  less.  One  lick  less. 
One  Hck  less  until  everybody  that  passes  in  the  road  will 
have  to  stop  and  see  it  and  say  what  a  fine  carpenter  he 
is.  If  it  had  just  been  rne  when  Cash  fell  off  of  that 
church  and  if  it  had  just  been  me  when  pa  laid  sick  with 
that  load  of  wood  fell  on  him,  it  would  not  be  happening 
with  every  bastard  in  the  county  coming  in  to  stare  at 
her  because  if  there  is  a  God  what  the  hell  is  He  for.  It 
would  just  be  me  and  her  on  a  high  hill  and  me  rolling 

347 


348  AS     I     LAY     DYING 

ihe  rocks  down  the  hill  at  their  faces,  picking  them  up 
and  throwing  them  down  the  hill,  faces  and  teeth  and  aU 
by  God  until  she  was  quiet  and  not  that  goddamn  adze 
going  One  lick  less.  One  lick  less  and  we  could  be  quiet 


DARL 


WE  WATCH  BOM  COME  AROUND  THE  CORNER  AND 
mount  the  steps.  He  does  not  look  at  us.  <cYou 
ready?"  he  says. 

"if  you're  hitched  up,"  I  say.  I  say  "Wait."  He  stops, 
looking  at  pa.  Vernon  spits,  without  moving.  He  spits 
with  decorous  and  deliberate  precision  into  the  pocked 
dust  below  the  porch.  Pa  rubs  his  hands  slowly  on  his 
knees.  He  is  gazing  out  beyond  the  crest  of  the  bluff,  out 
across  the  land.  Jewel  watches  him  a  moment,  then  he 
goes  on  to  the  pail  and  drinks  again. 

"I  mislike  undecision  as  much  as  ere  a  man/*  pa  says. 

"It  means  three  dollars/'  I  say.  The  shirt  across  pa's 
hump  is  faded  lighter  than  the  rest  of  it.  There  is  no 
sweat  stain  on  his  shirt.  I  have  never  seen  a  sweat  stain 
on  his  shirt.  He  was  sick  once  from  working  in  the  sun 
when  he  was  twenty-two  years  old,  and  he  tells  people 
that  if  he  ever  sweats,  he  will  die.  I  suppose  he  believes 
it 

TBut  if  she  don't  last  until  you  get  back/'  he  says.  "Sh@ 
will  be  disappointed/' 


AS     I     LAY     DYING 

Vemon  spits  into  the  dust.  But  it  will  rain  before 
morning. 

"She's  counted  on  it,"  pa  says.  "Shell  want  to  start 
right  away.  I  know  her.  I  promised  her  I'd  keep  the  team 
here  and  ready,  and  she's  counting  on  it" 

"Well  need  that  three  dollars  then,  sure/5  I  sav.  He 
gazes  out  over  the  land,  rubbing  his  hands  on  his  knees. 
Since  he  lost  his  teeth  his  mouth  collapses  in  slow  repeti- 
tion when  he  dips.  The  stubble  gives  his  lower  face  that 
appearance  that  old  dogs  have.  "You'd  better  make  up 
your  mind  soon,  so  we  can  get  there  and  get  a  load  on 
before  dark/'  I  say. 

"Ma  ain't  that  sick,"  Jewel  says.  "Shut  up,  Darl/* 

"That's  right,"  Vemon  says.  "She  seems  more  like  her- 
self today  than  she  has  in  a  week.  Time  you  and  Jewel 
get  back,  shell  be  setting  up." 

"You  ought  to  know/'  Jewel  says.  "You  been  here  often 
enough  looking  at  her.  You  or  your  folks."  Vemon  looks 
at  him.  Jewel's  eyes  look  like  pale  wood  in  his  high- 
blooded  face.  He  is  a  head  taller  than  any  of  the  rest  of 
us,  always  was.  I  told  them  that's  why  ma  always 
whipped  him  and  petted  him  more.  Because  he  was  peak- 
ling  around  the  house  more.  That's  why  she  named  him 
Jewel  I  told  them. 

"Shut  up,  Jewel/'  pa  says,  but  as  though  he  is  not 
listening  much.  He  gazes  out  across  the  land,  rubbing  his 
knees. 

"You  could  borrow  the  loan  of  Vernon's  team  and  we 
could  catch  up  with  you/'  I  say.  "If  she  didn't  wait  for 
us." 

"Ah,  shut  your  goddamn  mouth/'  Jewel  says. 

"Shell  want  to  go  in  ourn,"  pa  says.  He  rubs  his  knees, 
"Don't  ere  a  man  mislike  it  more." 

"It's   laying   there,   watching    Cash  whittle   on   that 


35°  AS     I     LAY     DYIXG 

damn  .  .  ."  Jewel  says.  He  says  It  harshly,  savagely,, 
but  he  does  not  say  the  word.  Like  a  little  boy  in  the 
dark  to  flail  Ms  courage  and  suddenly  aghast  into  silence 
by  his  own  noise. 

"She  wanted  that  like  she  wants  to  go  in  our  own 
wagon,"  pa  says.  "She'll  rest  easier  for  knowing  it's  a 
good  one,  and  private.  She  was  ever  a  private  woman. 
You  know  it  well." 

Then  let  it  be  private/'  Jewel  says.  "But  how  the 

tell  can  you  expect  it  to  be "  He  looks  at  the  back 

of  pa's  head,  his  eyes  like  pale  wooden  eyes. 

"Sho?"  Veraon  says,  "shell  hold  on  till  It's  finished, 
She'll  hold  on  till  everything's  ready,  till  her  own  good 
time.  And  with  the  roads  like  they  are  now,  It  won't 
take  you  no  time  to  get  her  to  town.'* 

"It's  fixing  up  to  rain,"  pa  says.  "I  am  a  luckless  man. 
I  have  ever  been."  He  rubs  his  hands  on  his  knees.  "It's 
that  durn  doctor,  liable  to  come  at  any  time.  I  couldn't 
get  word  to  him  till  so  late.  If  he  was  to  come  tomorrow 
and  tell  her  the  time  was  nigh,  she  wouldn't  wait.  I  know 
her.  Wagon  or  no  wagon,  she  wouldn't  wait.  Then  she'd 
be  upset,,  and  I  wouldn't  upset  her  for  the  living  world. 
With  that  family  burying-ground  in  Jefferson  and  them 
of  her  blood  waiting  for  her  there,  she'll  be  impatient.  I 
promised  my  word  me  and  the  boys  would  get  her  there 
quick  as  mules  could  walk  it,  so  she  could  rest  quiet." 
He  rubs  his  hands  on  his  knees.  "No  man  ever  misliked 
it  more." 

"If  everybody  wasn't  burning  hell  to  get  her  there/* 
Jewel  says  in  that  harsh,  savage  voice.  "With  Cash  all 
day  long  right  under  the  window,  hammering  and  saw- 
ing at  that " 

"It  was  her  wish,**  pa  says.  "You  got  no  affection  nor 
gentleness  for  her.  You  never  had.  We  would  be  be- 


AS     I     LAY     DYING  351 

holden  to  no  man/*  he  says,  "me  and  her.  We  have  never 
yet  been,  and  she  will  rest  quieter  for  knowing  it  and  that 
it  was  her  own  blood  sawed  out  the  boards  and  drove 
the  nails.  She  was  ever  one  to  clean  up  after  herself/" 

*It  means  three  dollars/9  I  say.  "Do  you  want  us  to 
go,  or  not?"  Pa  rubs  his  knees.  "We'll  be  back  by  to- 
morrow sundown/7 

"Well  .  .  /*  pa  says.  He  looks  out  over  the  land,  awry- 
haired,  mouthing  the  snuff  slowly  against  his  gums. 

"Come  on,"  Jewel  says.  He  goes  down  the  steps. 
Vernon  spits  neatly  into  the  dust 

"By  sundown,  now,"  pa  says.  *!  would  not  keep  her 
waiting.'* 

Jewel  glances  back,  then  he  goes  on  around  the  house. 
I  enter  the  hall,  hearing  the  voices  before  I  reach  the 
door.  Tilting  a  little  down  the  hill,  as  our  house  does9 
a  breeze  draws  through  the  hall  all  the  time,  upslanting, 
A  feather  dropped  near  the  front  door  will  rise  and  brush 
along  the  ceiling,  slanting  backward,  until  it  reaches  the 
down-turning  current  at  the  back  door:  so  with  voices. 
As  you  enter  the  hall,  they  sound  as  though  they  were 
speaking  out  of  the  air  about  your  head. 


CORA 


IT  WAS  THE  SWEETEST  THING  I  EVER  SAW.  IT  WAS  LIKE  HE 
knew  he  would  never  see  her  again,  that  Anse  Bundren 
was  driving  him  from  his  mother's  death-bed,  never  to 
see  her  to  this  world  again.  I  always  said  Darl  was  dif- 


AS     I     LAY     DYING 

ferent  from  those  others.  I  always  said  lie  was  the  only 
one  of  them  that  had  his  mother's  nature,  had  any 
natural  affection.  Not  that  Jewel,  the  one  she  laboured 
so  to  bear  and  coddled  and  petted  so  and  him  flinging 
into  tantrums  or  sulking  spells,  inventing  devilment  to 
devil  her  till  I  would  have  frailed  him  time  and  time.  Not 
him  to  come  and  tell  her  good-bye.  Not  him  to  miss  a 
chance  to  make  that  extra  three  dollars  at  the  price  of 
his  mother's  good-bye  kiss.  A  Bundren  through  and 
through,  loving  nobody,  caring  for  nothing  except  how 
to  get  something  with  the  least  amount  of  work.  Mr. 
Tull  says  Darl  asked  them  to  wait.  He  said  Darl  almost- 
begged  them  on  his  knees  not  to  force  him  to  leave  her 
in  her  condition.  But  nothing  would  do  but  Anse  and 
Jewel  must  make  that  three  dollars.  Nobody  that  knows 
Anse  cotild  have  expected  different,  but  to  think  of  that 
boy,  that  Jewel,  selling  all  those  years  of  self-denial  and 
down-right  partiality — they  couldn't  fool  me:  Mr.  Tull 
says  Mrs.  Bundren  liked  Jewel  the  least  of  all,  but  I  knew 
better.  I  knew  she  was  partial  to  him,  to  the  same  quality 
in  him  that  let  her  put  up  with  Anse  Bundren  when 
Mr.  Tull  said  she  ought  to  poisoned  him — for  three  dol- 
lars, denying  his  dying  mother  the  good-bye  kiss. 

Why,  for  the  last  three  weeks  I  have  been  coming 
over  every  time  I  could,  coming  sometimes  when  I 
shouldn't  have,  neglecting  my  own  family  and  duties  so 
that  somebody  would  be  with  her  in  her  last  moments 
and  she  would  not  have  to  face  the  Great  Unknown  with- 
out one  familiar  face  to  give  her  courage.  Not  that  I  de- 
serve credit  for  it:  I  will  expect  the  same  for  myself.  But 
thank  God  it  will  be  the  faces  of  my  loved  kin,  my  blood 
and  flesh,  for  in  my  husband  and  children  I  have  been 
more  blessed  than  most,  trials  though  they  have  been  at 
times. 


AS     I     LAY     DYING  355 

lived,  a  lonely  woman,  lonely  with  her  pride,  try- 
ing to  make  folks  believe  different,  hiding  fact  'that 
they  just  suffered  her,  because  she  was  not  cold  in  the 
coffin  before  they  were  carting  her  forty  away  to 

bury  her,  flouting  the  will  of  God  to  do  it.  Refusing  to 
let  her  He  in  the  same  earth  with  those  Bundrens. 

"But  she  wanted  to  go/'  Mr.  lull  said.  "It  was  her 
own  wish  to  He  among  her  own  people.** 

"Then  why  didn't  she  go  aliveF*  I  said.  "Not  one  of 
them  would  have  stopped  her,  with  even  that  little  erne 
almost  old  enough  now  to  be  selfish  and  stone-hearted 
like  the  rest  of  them." 

"It  was  her  own  wish,"  Mr.  Toll  said*  TC  heard  Anse 
say  it  was/* 

*'And  you  would  beHeve  Anse,  of  course,10  I  said.  "A 
man  like  you  would.  Don't  tell  me.** 

*Td  believe  him  about  something  he  couldn't  expect 
to  make  anything  off  of  me  by  not  telling,"  Mr.  Tull  said. 

TDon't  tell  me,"  I  said.  "A  woman's  place  is  with  her 
husband  and  children,  aHve  or  dead.  Would  you  expect 
me  to  want  to  go  back  to  Alabama  and  leave  you  and  the 
girls  when  my  time  comes,  that  I  left  of  my  own  will  to 
cast  my  lot  with  yours  for  better  and  worse,  until  death 
and  after?" 

"Well,  folks  are  different,"  he  said. 

I  should  hope  so.  I  have  tried  to  live  right  in  the  sight 
of  God  and  man,  for  the  honour  and  comfort  of  my 
Christian  husband  and  the  love  and  respect  of  my  Chris-1 
tian  children.  So  that  when  I  lay  me  down  in  the  con- 
sciousness of  my  duty  and  reward  I  will  be  surrounded 
by  loving  faces,  carrying  the  farewel  kiss  of  each  of  my 
loved  ones  into  my  reward.  Not  like  Addie  Bundren 
dying  alone,  hiding  her  pride  and  her  broken  heart.  Glad 
to  go.  Lying  there  with  her  head  propped  up  so  she  could 


3H  AS     I     1.AY     BYI2STG 

watch  Cash  building  the  coffin,  having  to  watch  him  so 
lie  would  not  skimp  on  it,  like  as  not,  with  those  men  not 
worrying  about  anything  except  if  there  was  time  to  earn 
another  three  dollars  before  the  rain  came  and  the  river 
got  too  high  to  get  across  it.  Like  as  not,  if  they  hadn't 
decided  to  make  that  last  load,  they  would  have  loaded 
her  into  the  wagon  on  a  quilt  and  crossed  the  river  first 
and  then  stopped  and  give  her  time  to  die  what  Chris- 
tian death  they  would  let  her. 

Except  Darl.  It  was  the  sweetest  thing  I  ever  saw. 
Sometimes  I  lose  faith  in  human  nature  for  a  time;  I  am 
assailed  by  doubt.  But  always  the  Lord  restores  my  faith 
and  reveals  to  me  His  bounteous  love  for  His  creatures. 
Not  Jewel,  the  one  she  had  always  cherished,  not  him. 
He  was  after  that  three  extra  dollars.  It  was  Darl,  the 
one  that  folks  say  is  queer,  lazy,  pottering  about  the 
place  no  better  than  Anse,  with  Cash  a  good  carpenter 
and  always  more  building  than  he  can  get  around  to,  and 
Jewel  always  doing  something  that  made  him  some 
money  or  got  him  talked  about,  and  that  near-naked 
girl  always  standing  over  Addie  with  a  fan  so  that  every 
time  a  body  tried  to  talk  to  her  and  cheer  her  up,  would 
answer  for  her  right  quick,  like  she  was  trying  to  keep 
anybody  from  coming  near  her  at  all. 

It  was  Darl.  He  come  to  the  door  and  stood  there, 
looking  at  his  dying  mother.  He  just  looked  at  her,  and 
I  felt  the  bounteous  love  of  the  Lord  again  and  His 
mercy.  I  saw  that  with  Jewel  she  had  just  been  pretend- 
ing, but  that  it  was  between  her  and  Darl  that  the  under- 
standing and  the  true  love  was.  He  just  looked  at  her, 
not  even  coming  in  where  she  could  see  him  and  get  up- 
set, knowing  that  Anse  was  driving  him  away  and  he 
would  never  see  her  again.  He  said  nothing,  just  looking 
at  her. 


I      JLAY      DYING  355 

"What  you  wants  Darl?"  Dewey  Dell  said,  not 
stopping  the  fan,  speaking  op  quick,  keeping  even  him 
from  her.  He  didn't  answer.  He  just  stood  and  looked  at 
his  dying  mother,  his  heart  too  full  for  words. 


DEWEY    DELL 


r"JHHE  FERST  TIME  ME  AND  LAFE  PICKED  OX  DOWN  THE  ROW. 

A  Pa  dassent  sweat  because  he  will  catch  his  death 
from  the  sickness  so  everybody  that  comes  to  help  us. 
And  Jewel  don't  care  about  anything  he  is  not  Mn  to  us  in 
caring,  not  care-kin.  And  Cash  like  sawing  the  long  hot 
sad  yellow  days  up  into  planks  and  nailing  them  to 
something.  And  pa  thinks  because  neighbours  will  always 
treat  one  another  that  way  because  he  has  always 
been  too  busy  letting  neighbours  do  for  him  to  find  out. 
And  I  did  not  think  that  Darl  would,  that  sits  at  the 
supper  table  with  his  eyes  gone  further  than  the  food  and 
the  lamp,  full  of  the  land  dug  out  of  his  skull  and  the 
holes  filled  with  distance  beyond  the  land. 

We  picked  on  down  the  row,  the  woods  getting  closer 
and  closer  and  the  secret  shade,  picking  on  into  the  secret 
shade  with  my  sack  and  Lafe's  sack.  Because  I  said  will 
I  or  won't  I  when  the  sack  was  half -full  because  I  said  if 
the  sack  is  full  when  we  get  to  the  woods  it  won't  be  me, 
I  said  if  it  don't  mean  for  me  to  do  it  the  sack  will  not  be 
full  and  I  will  turn  up  the  next  row  but  if  the  sack  is 
full,  I  cannot  help  it.  It  will  be  that  I  had  to  do  it  all 


AS      I     .LAY     DYING 

the  time  and  I  cannot  help  it.  And  we  picked  on  toward 
the  secret  shade  and  our  eyes  would  drown  together 
touching  on  his  hands  and  my  hands  and  I  didn't  say 
anything.  I  said  "What  are  you  doing?"  and  lie  said  **I 
am  picking  into  your  sack."  And  so  it  was  full  when  we 
came  to  the  end  of  the  row  and  I  could  not  help  it. 

And  so  it  was  because  I  could  not  help  it.  It  was  then, 
and  then  I  saw  Darl  and  he  knew.  He  said  he  knew  with- 
out the  words  like  he  told  me  that  ma  is  going  to  die 
without  words,  and  I  knew  he  knew  because  if  he  had 
said  he  knew  with  the  words  I  would  not  have  believed 
that  he  had  been  there  and  saw  us.  But  he  said  he  did 
know  and  I  said  "Are  you  going  to  tell  pa  are  you  going 
to  kill  him?"  without  the  words  I  said  it  and  he  said 
"Why?"  without  the  words.  And  that's  why  I  can  talk  to 
him  with  knowing  with  hating  because  he  knows. 

He  stands  in  the  door?  looking  at  her. 

"What  you  want,  Darl?"  I  say. 

**She  is  going  to  die/'  he  says.  And  old  turkey-buzzard 
Tull  coming  to  watch  her  die  but  I  can  fool  them, 

'When  is  she  going  to  die?"  I  say. 

"Before  we  get  back,"  he  says. 

*Then  why  are  you  taking  Jewel?"  I  say* 

"I  want  him  to  help  me  load,"  he  says* 


TULL 


KEEPS    ON  RUBBING   HIS   KNEES.    HIS   OVERALLS    ABE 

X1L  faded;  on  one  knee  a  serge  patch  cut  out  of  a  pair  of 
Sunday  pants,  wore  iron-slick.  "No  man  mislikes  It  more 
than  me/'  he  says. 

"A  fellow's  got  to  guess  ahead  now  and  then/*  I  say* 
"But,  come  long  and  short,  it  won*t  be  no  harm  done 
neither  way." 

"She  II  want  to  get  started  right  off,"  he  says.  "It s  far 
enough  to  Jefferson  at  best/* 

"But  the  roads  is  good  now/'  I  say.  It's  fixing  to  rain 
tonight,  too.  His  folks  buries  at  New  Hope,  too,  not  three 
miles  away.  But  it's  just  like  him  to  marry  a  woman  born 
a  day's  hard  ride  away  and  have  her  die  on  him. 

He  looks  out  over  the  land,  rubbing  his  knees.  c*No 
man  so  mislikes  it/*  he  says. 

"They'll  get  back  in  plenty  of  time,"  I  say.  "I  wouldn't 
worry  none/* 

"It  means  three  dollars,"  he  says. 

"Might  be  it  won't  be  no  need  for  them  to  rush  back^ 
noways/'  I  say.  "I  hope  it." 

"She's  a-going/*  he  says.  "Her  mind  is  set  on  it/*  It's 
a  hard  life  on  women,  for  a  fact.  Some  women.  I  mind 
my  mammy  lived  to  be  seventy  and  more.  Worked  every 
day,  rain  or  shine;  never  a  sick  day  since  her  last  chap 
was  born  until  one  day  she  kind  of  looked  around  her  and 
then  she  went  and  taken  that  lace-trimmed  night-gown 
she  had  had  forty-five  years  and  never  wore  out  of  the 
chest  and  put  it  on  and  laid  down  on  the  bed  and  pulled 

3J7 


358  AS      I     LAY     DYIXG 

the  covers  up  and  shut  her  eyes.  "You  all  will  have  to 
look  out  for  pa  the  best  you  can/*  she  said.  Tin  tired." 

Anse  rubs  his  hands  on  his  knees.  "The  Lord  giveth/' 
lie  says.  We  can  hear  Cash  a-hammering  and  sawing 
beyond  the  corner. 

If  s  true.  Never  a  truer  breath  was  ever  breathed.  "The 
Lord  giveth/*  I  say. 

That  boy  comes  up  the  hill.  He  is  carrying  a  fish  nigh 
long  as  he  is.  He  slings  it  to  the  ground  and  grunts  "Hah" 
and  spits  over  his  shoulder  like  a  man.  Durn  nigh  long 
as  he  is. 

"What's  that?"  I  say.  "A  hog?  Where'd  you  get  it?" 

"Down  to  the  bridge/'  he  says.  He  turns  it  over,  the 
under-side  caked  over  with  dust  where  it  is  wet,  the  eye 
coated  over,  humped  under  the  dirt. 

"Are  you  aiming  to  leave  it  laying  there?"  Anse  says. 

*1  aim  to  show  it  to  ma/*  Vardaman  says.  He  looks 
toward  the  door.  We  can  hear  the  talking,  coining  out  on 
the  draught.  Cash,  too,  knocking  and  hammering  at  the 
boards.  "There's  company  in  there/'  he  says. 

"Just  my  folks/'  I  say.  "They'd  enjoy  to  see  it,  too." 

He  says  nothing,  watching  the  door.  Then  he  looks 
down  at  the  fish  laying  in  the  dust.  He  turns  it  over  with 
his  foot  and  prods  at  the  eye-bump  with  his  toe,  gouging 
at  it.  Anse  is  looking  out  over  the  land.  Vardaman  looks 
at  Anse's  face,  then  at  the  door.  He  turns,  going  toward 
the  corner  of  the  house,  when  Anse  calls  him  without 
looking  around. 

"You  clean  that  fish/'  Anse  says. 

Vardaman  stops.  "Why  can't  Dewey  Dell  clean  it?"* 
he  says. 

"You  clean  that  fish/'  Anse  says. 

"Aw,  pa,"  Vardaman  says. 

"You  clean  it,"  Anse  says.  He  don't  look  around.  Varda- 


AS     x     3C.A  Y      UYINC*  353? 

man  comes  back  and  picks  tip  the  fish.  It  slides  out  of 
his  hands,  smearing  wet  dirt  on  to  biro,  and  flops  down, 
dirtying  itself  again,  gap-mouthed,  goggle-eyed,  hiding 
into  the  dust  like  it  was  ashamed  of  being  dead,  like  it 
was  in  a  hurry  to  get  back  hid  again.  Vardaman  cusses  it. 
He  cusses  it  like  a  grown  man,  standing  a-straddle  of  it. 
Anse  don't  look  around.  Vardaman  picks  it  up  again.  He 
goes  on  around  the  house,  toting  it  in  both  arms  like  an 
armful  of  wood,  it  overlapping  him  on  both  ends,  head 
and  tail.  Durn  nigh  big  as  he  is. 

Anse*s  wrists  dangle  out  of  his  sleeves:  I  never  see  him 
with  a  shirt  on  that  looked  like  it  was  his  in  all  my  life. 
They  all  looked  like  Jewel  might  have  give  him  his  old 
ones.  Not  Jewel,  though.  He's  long-armed,  even  if  he  is 
spindling.  Except  for  the  lack  of  sweat.  You  could  tell 
they  ain't  been  nobody  else's  but  Anse's  that  way  without 
no  mistake.  His  eyes  look  like  pieces  of  bumt-out  cinder 
fixed  in  his  face,  looking  out  over  the  land. 

When  the  shadow  touches  the  steps  he  says  Ttt's  five 
o'clock." 

Just  as  I  get  up  Cora  comes  to  the  door  and  says  it's 
time  to  get  on.  Anse  reaches  for  his  shoes.  "Now,  Mr. 
Bundren,"  Cora  says,  "don't  you  get  up  now."  He  puts  his 
shoes  on,  stomping  into  them,  like  he  does  everything 
like  he  is  hoping  all  the  time  he  really  ca^'t  do  it  and  can 
quit  trying  to.  When  we  go  up  the  hall  we  can  hear 
them  clumping  on  the  floor  like  they  was  iron  shoes.  He 
comes  toward  the  door  where  she  is,  blinking  his  eyes, 
kind  of  looking  ahead  of  hisself  before  he  sees,  like  he  is 
hoping  to  find  her  setting  up,  in  a  chair  maybe  or  maybe 
sweeping,  and  looks  into  the  door  in  that  surprised  way 
like  he  looks  in  and  finds  her  still  in  bed  every  time  and 
Dewey  Dell  still  a-fanning  her  with  the  fan.  He  stands 
there,  like  he  don't  aim  to  move  again  nor  nothing  else 


AS     I     LAY     DYING 

"Well,  I  reckon  we  better  get  on/*  Cora  says.  "I  got  to 
feed  the  chickens."  It's  fixing  to  rain,  too.  Clouds  like  that 
don't  lie,  and  the  cotton  making  every  day  the  Lord 
sends.  That'll  be  something  else  for  him.  Cash  is  still 
trimming  at  the  boards.  "If  there's  ere  a  thing  we  caa 
do,"  Cora  says. 

VnseTl  let  us  know,"  I  say. 

Anse  don't  look  at  us.  He  looks  around,  blinking,  in 
that  surprised  way,  like  he  had  wore  hisself  down  being 
Surprised  and  was  even  surprised  at  that.  If  Cash  just 
Works  that  careful  on  my  barn. 

"I  told  Anse  it  likely  won't  be  no  need/'  I  say,  <4I  so 
tope  it." 

"Her  mind  is  set  on  it,"  he  says.  "I  reckon  she's  bound 
to  go/' 

"It  comes  to  all  of  us/'  Cora  says.  "Let  the  Lord  com- 
fort you." 

"About  that  corn/*  I  say.  I  tell  him  again  I  will  help 
him  out  if  he  gets  into  a  tight,  with  her  sick  and  all.  Like 
most  folks  around  here,  I  done  holp  him  so  much  already 
I  can't  quit  now. 

"I  aimed  to  get  to  it  today,"  he  says.  "Seems  like  I  can't 
get  my  mind  on  nothing." 

"Maybe  she'll  hold  out  till  you  are  laid  by,"  I  say, 

"If  God  wills  it,"  he  says. 

"Let  Him  comfort  you,"  Cora  says. 

If  Cash  just  works  that  careful  on  my  barn.  He  looks 
tip  when  we  pass.  "Don't  reckon  111  get  to  you  this  week/' 
he  says. 

"  Tain't  no  rush/'  I  say.  "Whenever  you  get  around  to 
it* 

We  get  into  the  wagon.  Cora  sets  the  cake-box  on  her 
lap.  It's  fixing  to  rain,  sho. 


AS     I     LAY     BYING  361 

**I  don"t  know  what  hell  do/*  Cora  says.  **I  just  dont 
know.3' 

*Toor  Anse/*  I  say.  "She  kept  Mm  at  work  for  thirty- 
odd  years.  I  reckon  she  is  tired.** 

"And  I  reckon  shell  be  behind  him  for  thirty  years 
more/'  Kate  says.  "Or  if  it  ain't  her,  he'll  get  another  one 
before  cotton-picking/' 

T  reckon  Cash  and  Dar!  can  get  married  now/'  Eula 
says. 

That  poor  boy,"  Cora  says.  'The  poor  little  tyke." 

•What  abont  Jewel?"  Kate  says. 

"He  can,  too/*  Eula  says. 

TKumph/*  Kate  says.  "I  reckon  he  will.  I  reckon  so.  I 
reckon  there's  more  gals  than  one  around  here  that  don't 
want  to  see  Jewel  tied  down.  Well,  they  needn't  to 
worry.** 

"Why,  KateP  Cora  says.  The  wagon  begins  to  rattle. 
The  poor  little  tyke,"  Cora  says. 

It's  fixing  to  rain  this  night.  Yes,  sir.  A  rattling  wagon  is 
mighty  dry  weather,  for  a  Birdsell.  But  that'll  be  cured. 
It  will  for  a  fact. 

"She  ought  to  taken  them  cakes  after  she  said  she 
would,"  Kate  says. 


ANSE 


DUBN  THAT  ROAD.  AND  IT  FIXING  TO  RADST,  TOO.  I 
can  sfend  here  and  same  as  see  it  with  second-sight, 
a-shutting  down  behind  them  like  a  wall,  shutting  down 
betwixt  them  and  my  given  promise.  I  do  the  best  I  can, 
much  as  I  can  get  my  mind  on  anything,  but  durn  them 
boys. 

A-laying  there,  right  up  to  my  door,  where  every  bad 
luck  that  comes  and  goes  is  bound  to  find  it  I  told 
Addie  it  wasn't  any  luck  living  on  a  road  when  it  come 
by  here,  and  she  said,  for  the  world  like  a  woman,  "Get 
up  and  move,  then."  But  I  told  her  it  wasn't  no  luck  in  it, 
because  the  Lord  put  roads  for  travelling:  why  He  laid 
them  down  flat  on  the  earth.  When  He  aims  for  some- 
thing to  be  always  a-moving,  He  makes  it  long  ways, 
like  a  road  or  a  horse  or  a  wagon,  but  when  He  aims  for 
something  to  stay  put,  He  makes  it  up-and-down  ways, 
like  a  tree  or  a  man.  And  so  he  never  aimed  for  folks  to 
live  on  a  road,  because  which  gets  there  first,  I  says,  the 
road  or  the  house?  Did  you  ever  know  Him  to  set  a  road 
down  by  a  house?  I  says.  No  you  never,  I  says,  because 
it's  always  men  can't  rest  till  they  gets  the  house  set  where 
everybody  that  passes  in  a  wagon  can  spit  in  the  door- 
way, keeping  the  folks  restless  and  wanting  to  get  up  and 
go  somewheres  else  when  He  aimed  for  them  to  stay  put 
like  a  tree  or  a  stand  of  corn.  Because  if  He'd  a  aimed 
for  man  to  be  always  a-moving  and  going  somewheres 
else,  wouldn't  He  a  put  him  longways  on  his  belly,  like 
a  snake?  It  stands  to  reason  He  would. 

362 


AS     I     LAY     BYIKG  3^3 

Putting  it  where  every  bad  luck  prowling  can  find  it 
and  come  straight  to  my  door,  charging  me  taxes  on  top 
of  it.  Making  me  pay  for  Cash  having  to  get  them  car- 
penter notions  when  if  it  hadn't  been  no  road  come  there, 
he  wouldn't  a  got  them;  falling  off  of  churches  and  lift- 
ing no  hand  in  six  months  and  me  and  Addie  slaving  and 
a-slaving,  when  there's  plenty  of  sawing  on  this  place  lie 
could  do  if  he's  got  to  saw. 

And  Darl,  too.  Talking  me  out  of  him,  dum  them.  It 
ain't  that  I  am  afraid  of  work;  I  always  have  fed  me  and 
mine  and  kept  a  roof  above  us:  it's  that  they  would  short- 
hand me  just  because  he  tends  to  his  own  business,  just 
because  he's  got  his  eyes  full  of  the  land  all  the  time.  I 
says  to  them,  he  was  all  right  at  first,  with  his  eyes  full  of 
the  land,  because  the  land  laid  up-and-down  ways  then; 
it  wasn't  till  that  ere  road  come  and  switched  the  land 
around  longways  and  his  eyes  still  full  of  the  land,  that 
they  begun  to  threaten  me  out  of  him,  trying  to  short- 
hand me  with  the  law. 

Making  me  pay  for  it.  She  was  well  and  hale  as  ere  a 
woman  ever  were,  except  for  that  road.  Just  laying  down, 
resting  herself  in  her  own  bed,  asking  naught  of  none. 
"Are  you  sick,  Addie?"  I  said. 

"I  am  not  sick,"  she  said. 

"You  lay  you  down  and  rest  you,"  I  said.  *I  knowed 
you  are  not  sick.  You're  just  tired.  You  lay  you  down  and 
rest." 

"I  am  not  sick,"  she  said.  "I  will  get  up." 

"Lay  still  and  rest,"  I  said.  "You  are  just  tired.  You  cam 
get  up  tomorrow."  And  she  was  laying  there,  well  and 
hale  as  ere  a  woman  ever  were,  except  for  that  road. 

"I  never  sent  for  you,"  I  said.  "I  take  you  to  witness  I 
never  sent  for  you." 


AS     I     LAY     DYING" 

*I  know  yon  didn't/*  Peabody  said*  "I  bound  that. 
Where  is  she?'' 

"She's  a-laying  down/*  I  said.  "She's  just  a  little  tired, 
but  shell  • " 

"Get  outen  here,  Anse,"  he  said.  "Go  set  on  the  porch  a 
while" 

And  now  I  got  to  pay  for  it,  me  without  a  tooth  in  my 
head,  hoping  to  get  ahead  enough  so  I  could  get  my 
mouth  fixed  where  I  could  eat  God's  own  victuals  as  a 
man  should,  and  her  hale  and  well  as  ere  a  woman  in  the 
land  until  that  day.  Got  to  pay  for  being  put  to  the  need 
of  that  three  dollars.  Got  to  pay  for  the  way  for  them 
boys  to  have  to  go  away  to  earn  it.  And  now  I  can  see 
same  as  second  sight  the  rain  shutting  down  betwixt  us, 
a-eoming  up  that  road  like  a  dum  man,  like  it  wasn't  ere 
a  other  house  to  rain  on  in  all  the  living  land. 

I  have  heard  men  cuss  their  luck,  and  right,  for  they 
were  sinful  men.  But  I  do  not  say  it's  a  curse  on  me,  be- 
cause I  have  done  no  wrong  to  be  eussed  by.  I  am  not 
religious,  I  reckon.  But  peace  is  my  heart:  I  know  it  is.  I 
have  done  things  but  neither  better  nor  worse  than  them 
that  pretend  otherlike,  and  I  know  that  Old  Marster  will 
care  for  me  as  for  ere  a  sparrow  that  falls.  But  it  seems 
hard  that  a  man  in  his  need  could  be  so  flouted  by  a  road. 

Vardaman  comes  around  the  house,  bloody  as  a  hog  to 
his  knees,  and  that  ere  fish  chopped  up  with  the  axe  like 
as  not,  or  maybe  throwed  away  for  him  to  lie  about  the 
dogs  et  it.  Well,  I  reckon  I  ain't  no  call  to  expect  no  more 
of  him  than  of  his  mangrowed  brothers.  He  comes 
along,  watching  the  house,  quiet,  and  sits  on  the  steps. 
"Whew,"  he  says,  "I'm  pure  tired." 

"Go  wash  them  hands,"  I  say.  But  couldn't  no  woman 
strove  harder  than  Addie  to  make  them  right,  man  and 
boy:  I'll  say  that  for  her. 


AS     f     LAY     DYING 

*It  was  full  of  blood  and  guts  as  a  hog/*  he  says.  But  I 
fust  can't  seem  to  get  no  heart  into  anything,  with  tibii 
here  weather  sapping  me,  too.  "Pa/"  he  says,  **is  ma  sick 
some  more?'* 

"Go  wash  them  hands/'  I  say.  But  I  Just  can't  to 

get  no  heart  into  it. 


DARL 


HE  HAS  BEEN  TO  TOWN  THIS  WEEK;  THE  BACK  OF  HIS 
neck  is  trimmed  close,  with  a  white  line  between 
hair  and  sunburn  like  a  joint  of  white  bone.  He  has  not 
once  looked  back. 

"Jewel,"  I  say.  Back  running,  tunnelled  between  the 
two  sets  of  bobbing  mule  ears,  the  road  vanishes  beneath 
the  wagon  as  though  it  were  a  ribbon  and  the  front  axle 
were  a  spool.  "Do  you  know  she  is  going  to  die,  Jewel?*" 

It  takes  two  people  to  make  you,  and  one  people  to 
Ae.  That's  how  the  world  is  going  to  end. 

I  said  to  Dewey  Dell:  "You  want  her  to  die  so  you  can 
get  to  town:  is  that  it?"  She  wouldn't  say  what  we  both 
knew.  "The  reason  you  will  not  say  it  is,  when  you  say 
it,  even  to  yourself,  you  will  know  it  is  true:  is  that  it? 
But  you  know  it  is  true  now.  I  can  almost  tell  you  the 
day  when  you  knew  it  is  true.  Why  won't  you  say  it,  even 
to  yourself?"  She  will  not  say  it  She  just  keeps  on  saying 
Are  you  going  to  tell  pa?  Are  you  going  to  kill  him? 
**You  cannot  believe  it  is  true  because  you  cannot  believe 


AS     I     LAY     DYING 

that  Dewey  Dell,  Dewey  Dell  Bundren,  could  have  such 
bad  luck:  is  that  it?" 

The  SUB,  an  hour  above  the  horizon,  is  poised  like  a 
bloody  egg  upon  a  crest  of  thunderheads;  the  light  has 
tamed  copper:  in  the  eye  portentous,  in  the  nose  sulphur- 
ous, smelling  of  lightning.  When  Peabody  comes,  they 
will  have  to  use  the  rope.  He  has  pussel-gutted  himself 
eating  cold  greens.  With  the  rope  they  will  haul  Mm  up 
the  path,  balloon-like  up  the  sulphurous  air. 

"Jewel,'*  I  say,  "do  you  know  that  Addie  Bundren  is  go- 
ing to  die?  Addie  Bundren  is  going  to  die?" 


PEABODY 


WHEN  ANSE  FINAIXY  SENT  FOR  ME  OF  HIS  OWN  AC- 
cord,  I  said  "He  has  wore  ner  out  at  last."  And  I 
said  a  damn  good  thing  and  at  first  I  would  not  go  be- 
cause there  might  be  something  I  could  do  and  I  would 
have  to  haul  her  back,  by  God.  I  thought  maybe  they 
have  the  same  sort  of  fool  ethics  in  heaven  they  have  in 
the  Medical  College  and  that  it  was  maybe  Vernon  Tull 
sending  for  me  again,  getting  me  there  in  the  nick  of 
'time,  as  Vernon  always  does  things,  getting  the  most  for 
Anse's  money  like  lie  does  for  his  own.  But  when  it  got 
far  enough  into  the  day  for  me  to  read  weather  sign  I 
knew  it  couldn't  have  been  anybody  but  Anse  that  sent 
I  knew  that  nobody  but  a  luckless  man  could  ever  need 
a  doctor  in  tie  face  of  a  cyclone.  And  I  knew  that  if  it 


AS     I     LAY 

had  finally  occurred  to  Anse  himself  that  he  needed  onef 
it  was  already  too  late. 

When  I  reach  the  spring  and  get  down  and  hitch  the 
team,  the  sun  has  gone  down  behind  a  bank  of  black 
cloud  like  a  top-heavy  mountain  range,  like  a  load  of 
cinders  dumped  over  there,  and  there  is  no  wind.  I  could 
hear  Cash  sawing  for  a  mile  before  1  got  there.  Anse  is 
standing  at  the  top  of  the  bluff  above  the  path. 

"Whereas  the  horse?1*  I  say. 

"Jewel's  taken  and  gone/'  he  says.  "Can't  nobody  else 
ketch  hit  You'll  have  to  walk  up,  I  reckon." 

"Me,  walk  up,  weighing  two  hundred  and  twenty-five 
pounds?"  I  say.  "Walk  up  that  durn  wall?"  He  stands 
there  beside  a  tree.  Too  bad  the  Lord  made  the  mistake 
of  giving  trees  roots  and  giving  the  Anse  Bundrens  He 
makes  feet  and  legs.  If  He'd  just  swapped  them,  there 
wouldn't  ever  be  a  worry  about  this  country  being  de- 
forested some  day.  Or  any  other  country.  "What  do  you 
aim  for  me  to  do?"  I  say.  "Stay  here  and  get  blowed  clean 
out  of  the  county  when  that  cloud  breaks?"  Even  with 
the  horse  it  would  take  me  fifteen  minutes  to  ride  up 
across  the  pasture  to  the  top  of  the  ridge  and  reach  the 
house.  The  path  looks  like  a  crooked  limb  blown  against 
the  bluff.  Anse  has  not  been  in  town  in  twelve  years, 
And  how  his  mother  ever  got  up  there  to  bear  him,  he 
being  his  mother's  son. 

"Vardaman's  gittin*  the  rope/'  he  says. 

After  a  while  Vardaman  appears  with  the  ploughline. 
He  gives  the  end  of  it  to  Anse  and  conies  down  the  path* 
uncoiling  it. 

"You  hold  it  tight/'  I  say.  "I  done  already  wrote  this 
visit  on  to  my  books,  so  I'm  going  to  charge  you  just  the 
same,  whether  I  get  there  or  not." 

"I  got  hit,"  Anse  says.  "You  kin  come  on  up.** 


Ag     I     LAT     DYING 

111  be  damned  if  I  can  see  why  I  don't  quit  A  man 
seventy  years  old,  weighing  two  hundred  and  odd 
pounds,  being  hauled  up  and  down  a  damn  mountain  on 
a  rope.  I  reckon  it's  because  I  must  reach  the  fifty-thou- 
sand dollar  mark  of  dead  accounts  on  my  books  before  I 
can  quit.  <cWhat  the  hell  does  your  wife  mean/*  I  say, 
"taking  sick  on  top  of  a  durn  mountain?" 

Tm  right  sorry/*  he  says.  He  let  the  rope  go,  just 
dropped  it,  and  he  has  turned  toward  the  house.  There 
is  a  little  daylight  up  here  still,  of  the  colour  of  sulphur 
matches.  The  boards  look  like  strips  of  sulphur.  Cash 
does  not  look  back.  Vernon  Tull  says  he  brings  each 
board  up  to  the  window  for  her  to  see  it  and  say  it  is  all 
right.  The  boy  overtakes  us.  Anse  looks  back  at  him. 
"Where's  the  rope?"  he  says. 

It's  where  you  left  it/*  I  say.  "But  never  you  mind  that 
rope.  I  got  to  get  back  down  that  bluff.  I  don't  aim  for 
that  storm  to  catch  me  up  here.  I*d  blow  too  durn  far 
once  I  got  started." 

The  girl  is  standing  by  the  bed,  fanning  her.  When  we 
enter  she  turns  her  head  and  looks  at  us.  She  has  been 
dead  these  t<sn.  days.  I  suppose  it's  having  been  a  part  of 
Anse  for  so  long  that  she  cannot  even  make  that  change, 
if  change  it  be.  I  can  remember  how  when  I  was  young  I 
believed  death  to  be  a  phenomenon  of  the  body;  now 
I  know  it  to  be  merely  a  function  of  the  mind — and  that 
of  the  minds  of  the  ones  who  suffer  the  bereavement. 
The  nihilists  say  it  is  the  end;  the  fundamentalists,  the  be- 
ginning; when  in  reality  it  is  no  more  than  a  single  ten- 
ant or  family  moving  out  of  a  tenement  or  a  town. 

She  looks  at  us.  Only  her  eyes  seem  to  move.  It's  like 
they  touch  us,  not  with  sight  or  sense,  but  like  the  stream 
from  a  hose  touches  you,  the  stream  at  the  instant  of  in^ 
pact  as  dissociated  from  the  nozzle  as  though,  it  had 


AS     1     LAY     DYING 

never  been  there.  She  does  not  look  at  Anse  at  ail.  She 
looks  at  me,  then  at  the  boy.  Beneath  the  quilt  she  is  no 
more  than  a  bundle  of  rotten  sticks. 

"Well,  Miss  Addle,"  I  say.  The  girl  does  not  stop  the 
fan.  "How  are  you,  sister?"  I  say.  Her  head  lies  gaunt  on 
the  pillow,  looking  at  the  boy.  "You  picked  out  a  fine 
time  to  get  me  out  here  and  bring  up  a  storm."  Then  1 
send  Anse  and  the  boy  out*  She  watches  the  boy  as  he 
leaves  the  room.  She  has  not  moved  save  her  eyes. 

He  and  Anse  are  on  the  porch  when  I  come  out,  the 
boy  sitting  on  the  steps,  Anse  standing  by  a  post,  not  even 
leaning  against  it,  his  arms  dangling,  the  hair  pushed  and 
matted  up  on  his  head  like  a  dipped  rooster.  He  turns 
his  head,  blinking  at  me, 

"Why  didn't  you  send  for  me  sooner?**  I  say. 

"Hit  was  jest  one  thing  and  then  another/'  he  says. 
'That  ere  corn  me  and  the  boys  was  aimin*  to  git  up 
with,  and  Dewey  Dell  a-takuf  good  keer  of  her,  and 
folks  comin*  in,  a-offerin*  to  help  and  sich,  till  I  Jest 
thought  .  .  ." 

"Damn  the  money,"  I  say.  TDM  you  ever  hear  of  me 
worrying  a  fellow  before  he  was  ready  to  pay?" 

"Hit  ain't  begradgin'  the  money/'  he  says.  "I  jest  kept 
a-thinkin*.  .  .  .  She's  goin*,  is  she?"  The  durn  little  tyke  is 
sitting  on  the  top  step,  looking  smaller  than  ever  in  the 
sulphur-coloured  light.  That's  the  one  trouble  with  this 
country:  everything,  weather,  all,  hangs  on  too  long. 
Like  our  rivers,  our  land:  opaque,  slow,  violent;  shaping 
and  creating  the  life  of  man  in  its  implacable  and  brooa 
ing  image.  "I  knowed  hit,"  Anse  says.  "All  the  while  7. 
made  sho.  Her  mind  is  sot  on  hit." 

"And    a    damn    good   thing,   too,"     I  say.    "With   a 

trifling "  He  sits  on  the  top  step,  small,  motionless  IB 

faded  overalls.  When  I  came  out  he  looked  up  at  me, 


57°  AS    i    i,  AY    DYIXG 

then  at  Anse.  But  now  lie  has  stopped  looking  at  us.  H© 
just  sits  there. 

"Have  you  told  her  yit?"  Anse  says. 

"What  for?"  I  say.  "What  the  devil  for?" 

''Shell  know  hit.  I  knowed  that  when  she  see  you  she 
would  know  hit,  same  as  writing.  You  wouldn't  need  te 
tell  her.  Her  mind " 

Behind  us  the  girl  says,  "Paw/*  I  look  at  her,  at  her  f  ac  « 

*Tou  better  go  quick/*  I  say. 

When  we  enter  the  room  she  is  watching  the  door. 
She  looks  at  me.  Her  eyes  look  like  lamps  blaring  up  just 
before  the  oil  is  gone.  "She  wants  you  to  go  out/'  the  girl 
says. 

*vNow,  Addie/*  Anse  says,  "when  he  come  all  the  way 
from  Jefferson  to  git  you  well?"  She  watches  me:  I  can 
feel  her  eyes.  It's  like  she  was  shoving  at  me  with  them. 
I  have  seen  it  before  in  women.  Seen  them  drive  from  the 
room  them  coming  with  sympathy  and  pity,  with  actual 
help,  and  clinging  to  some  trifling  animal  to  whom  they 
never  were  more  than  pack-horses.  That's  what  they 
mean  by  the  love  that  passeth  understanding:  that  pride, 
that  furious  desire  to  hide  that  abject  nakedness  which 
we  bring  here  with  us,  carry  with  us  into  operating 
rooms,  carry  stubbornly  and  furiously  with  us  into  the 
earth  again.  I  leave  the  room.  Beyond  the  porch  Cadi's 
saw  snores  steadily  into  the  board.  A  minute  later  she 
calls  his  name,  her  voice  harsh  and  strong. 

"Cash,"  she  says;  "you,  Cash!" 


DARL 


PA  STANDS  BESIDE  THE  BED.  FROM  BEHIND  HIS  LEG 
Vardaman  peers,  with  his  round  head  and  his  eyes 
round  and  his  mouth  beginning  to  open.  She  looks  at  pa; 
all  her  failing  life  appears  to  drain  into  her  eyes,  urgent, 
irremediable.  "Ifs  Jewel  she  wants/*  Dewey  Del  says. 

"Why,  Addie/*  pa  says,  "him  and  Darl  went  to  make 
one  more  load.  They  thought  there  was  time.  That  you 
would  wait  for  them,  and  that  three  dollars  and  all  ,  .  " 
He  stoops,  laying  his  hand  on  hers.  For  a  while  yet  she 
looks  at  him,  without  reproach,  without  anything  at  all, 
as  if  her  eyes  alone  are  listening  to  the  Irrevocable  ces- 
sation of  his  voice.  Then  she  raises  herself,  who  has  not 
moved  in  ten  days.  Dewey  Dell  leans  down,,  trying  to 
press  her  back. 

"Ma"  she  says;  "ma." 

She  is  looking  out  the  window,  at  Cash  stooping 
steadily  at  the  board  in  the  failing  light,  labouring  on  to- 
ward darkness  and  into  it  as  though  the  stroking  of  the 
saw  illumined  its  own  motion,  board  and  saw  engen- 
dered. 

"You,  Cash/'  she  shouts,  her  voice  harsh,  strong,  and 
unimpaired.  ""You,  Cash!" 

He  looks  up  at  the  gaunt  face  framed  by  the  window 
in  the  twilight.  It  is  a  composite  picture  of  all  time  since 
he  was  a  child.  He  drops  die  saw  and  lifts  the  board  for 
her  to  see,  watching  the  window  in  which  the  face  has 
not  moved.  He  drags  a  second  plank  into  position  and 
slants  the  two  of  them  into  their  final  juxtaposition,  ges- 


3J2-  AS     I     LAY     DYING 

taring  toward  the  ones  yet  on  the  ground,  shaping  with 
his  empty  hand  in  pantomime  the  finished  box.  For  a 
while  still  she  looks  down  at  him  from  the  composite 
picture,  neither  with  censure  nor  approbation.  Then  the 
face  disappears,, 

She  lies  back  and  turns  her  head  without  so  much  as 
glancing  at  pa.  She  looks  at  Vardaman;  her  eyes,  the  life 
In  them,  rushing  suddenly  upon  them;  the  two  flames 
glare  up  for  a  steady  instant.  Then  they  go  out  as  though 
someone  had  leaned  down  and  blown  upon  them. 

"Ma,"  Dewey  Dell  says;  "ma!"  Leaning  above  the  bed, 
her  hands  lifted  a  little,  the  fan  still  moving  like  it  has  for 
ten  days,  she  begins  to  keen.  Her  voice  is  strong,  young> 
tremulous  and  clear,  rapt  with  its  own  timbre  and  vol- 
ume, the  fan  still  moving  steadily  up  and  down,  whisper- 
ing the  useless  air.  Then  she  flings  herself  across  Addie 
Bundren's  knees,  clutching  her,  shaking  her  with  the  fu- 
rious strength  of  the  young  before  sprawling  suddenly 
across  the  handful  of  rotten  bones  that  Addie  Bundren 
left,  jarring  the  whole  bed  into  a  chattering  sibilance  of 
mattress  shucks,  her  arms  outflung  and  the  fan  in  one 
hand  still  beating  with  expiring  breath  into  the  quilt. 

From  behind  pa's  leg  Vardaman  peers,  his  mouth  full 
open  and  all  colour  draining  from  his  face  into  his  mouth, 
as  though  he  has  by  some  means  fleshed  his  own  teeth  in 
himself,  sucking.  He  begins  to  move  slowly  backward 
from  the  bed,  his  eyes  round,  his  pale  face  fading  into  the 
dusk  like  a  piece  of  paper  pasted  on  a  failing  wall,  and 
so  out  of  the  door. 

Pa  leans  above  the  bed  in  the  twilight,  his  humped  sil- 
houette partaking  of  that  owl-like  quality  of  awry-feath- 
ered, disgruntled  outrage  within  which  lurks  a  wisdom 
too  profound  or  too  inert  for  even  thought. 

TDurn.  them  boys,"  he  says. 


AS     1     LAY     BYIX6  371 

Jetce^  I  say.  Overhead  the  drives  level  and  grey% 
hiding  the  by  a  of  grey  spears.  In 

a  little,  ijcllow  the  off 

one  clinging  in  sliding  lunges  to  the  of  the 

abo^e  the  ditch.  The  tilted  lumber  gleams  dull  yellow^ 
water-soaked  and  heavy  as  lead,  tilted  at  a 
into  the  ditch  above  the  broken  wheel;  the 

tered  spokes  and  about  Jewels  a  runnel  of  ijel« 

low  neither  water  nor  earth  swirls,  curving  with  the  yel- 
low road  neither  of  earth  nor  water y  down  hitt 
dissolving  into  a  streaming  muss  of  dark  green  neither  of 
earth  nor  sky.  Jewel9  I  say. 

Cash  comes  to  the  door,  carrying  the  saw.  Pa  stands 
beside  the  bed,  humped,  his  arms  dangling.  He  turns  his 
head,  his  shabby  profile,  his  chin  collapsing  slowly  as  he 
works  the  snuff  against  his  gums. 

"She's  gone/*  Cash  says* 

"She  taken  and  left  us/  pa  says.  Cash  does  not  look  at 
him.  "How  nigh  are  you  done?"  pa  says.  Cash  does  not 
answer.  He  enters,  carrying  the  saw.  *1  reckon  you  better 
get  at  it/*  pa  says.  "You'll  have  to  do  the  best  you  can* 
with  them  boys  gone  off  that-a-way."  Cash  looks  down 
at  her  face.  He  is  not  listening  to  pa  at  all.  He  does  not 
approach  the  bed.  He  stops  in  the  middle  of  the  floor, 
the  saw  against  his  leg,  his  sweating  arms  powdered 
lightly  with  sawdust,  his  face  composed.  "If  you  get  in  a 
tight,  maybe  some  of  themll  get  here  tomorrow  and 
help  you,"  pa  says.  "Vernon  could/'  Cash  is  not  listening. 
He  is  looking  down  at  her  peaceful,  rigid  face  fading  into 
the  dusk  as  though  darkness  were  a  precursor  of  the  ulti- 
mate earth,  until  at  last  the  face  seems  to  float  detached 
upon  it,  lightly  as  the  reflection  of  a  dead  leaf.  "There  is 
Christians  enough  to  help  you/5  pa  says.  Cash  is  not  lis- 
tening. After  a  while  he  turns  without  looking  at  pa  and 


374  AS      I     LAY     BYIXG 

leaves  the  room.  Then  the  saw  begins  to  snore  again. 
*TThey  will  help  us  in  our  sorrow/*  pa  says. 

The  sound  of  the  saw  is  steady,  competent,  unhurried, 
stirring  the  dying  light  so  that  at  each  stroke  her  face 
seems  to  wake  a  little  into  an  expression  of  listening  and 
of  waiting,,  as  though  she  were  counting  the  strokes.  Pa 
looks  down  at  the  face,  at  the  black  sprawl  of  Dewey 
DelTs  hair,  the  outflung  arms,  the  clutched  fan  now  mo- 
tionless on  the  fading  quilt.  "I  reckon  you  better  get 
supper  on/*  he  says. 

Dewey  Dell  does  not  move. 

"Git  up,  now,  and  put  supper  on/*  pa  says.  "We  got  to 
Iceep  our  strength  up.  I  reckon  Doctor  Peabody's  right 
hungry,  coming  all  this  way.  And  Cash'll  need  to  eat 
quick  and  get  back  to  work  so  he  can  finish  it  in  time/* 

Dewey  Dell  rises,  heaving  to  her  feet.  She  looks  down 
at  the  face.  It  is  like  a  casting  of  fading  bronze  upon  the 
pillow,  the  hands  alone  still  with  any  semblance  of  life: 
a  curled,  gnarled  inertness;  a  spent  yet  alert  quality  from 
which  weariness,  exhaustion,  travail  has  not  yet  departed, 
as  though  they  doubted  even  yet  the  actuality  of  rest, 
guarding  with  homed  and  penurious  alertness  the  cessa- 
tion which  they  know  cannot  last. 

Dewey  Dell  stoops  and  slides  the  quilt  from  beneath 
them  and  draws  it  up  over  them  to  the  chin,  smoothing  it 
down,  drawing  it  smooth.  Then  without  looking  at  pa 
she  goes  around  the  bed  and  leaves  the  room. 

She  will  go  out  where  Peabody  is,  where  she  can  stand 
in  the  twilight  and  look  at  his  back  with  such  an  expres- 
sion that,  feeling  her  eyes  and  turning,  he  will  say;  I 
would  not  let  it  grieve  me,  now.  She  was  old,  and  sick 
too.  Suffering  more  than  we  knew.  She  couldnt  have  got 
well.  Vardamans  getting  big  now,  and  with  you  to  take 
lood  care  of  them  all.  I  would  try  not  to  let  it  grieve 


AS     I     LAY     DYING  3?S 

me.  I  expect  yotid  better  go  and  get  some  supper  ready, 
It  don't  have  to  be  much.  But  they'll  need  to  eat*  and 
she  looking  at  him?  saying  lou  could  do  so  much  for  me 
if  you  just  would.  If  you  just  knew.  I  am  I  and  you  are 
you  and  I  know  it  and  you  dont  know  it  and  you  could 
do  so  much  for  me  if  you  just  would  and  if  you  just 
would  then  I  could  tell  you  and  then  nobody  would 
have  to  know  it  except  you  and  me  and  DarL 

Pa  stands  over  the  bed,  dangie-amied,  humped*  mo- 
tionless.  He  raises  his  hand  to  his  head,  scouring  Hs  hairv 
listening  to  the  saw.  He  comes  nearer  and  rubs  his  hand» 
palm  and  back,  on  his  thigh  and  lays  it  on  her  face  and 
then  on  the  hump  of  quilt  where  her  hands  are.  He 
touches  the  quilt  as  he  saw  Dewey  Dell  do,  trying  to 
smooth  it  up  to  the  chin,  but  disarranging  it  instead.  He 
tries  to  smooth  it  again,  clumsily,  his  hand  awkward  as 
a  claw,  smoothing  at  the  wrinkles  which  he  made  and 
which  continue  to  emerge  beneath  his  hand  with  perverse 
ubiquity,  so  that  at  last  he  desists,  his  hand  falling  to  his 
side  and  stroking  itself  again,  palm  and  back,  on  his 
thigh.  The  sound  of  the  saw  snores  steadily  into  the 
room.  Pa  breathes  with  a  quiet,  rasping  sound,  mouth- 
ing the  snuff  against  his  gums.  "God's  will  be  done,"  lie 
says,  "Now  I  can  get  them  teeth/' 

Jewels  hat  droops  limp  about  his  neck,  channelling 
water  on  to  the  soaked  tow-sack  tied  about  his  shoulders 
as,  ankle-deep  in  the  running  ditch,  he  pries  with  a  slip* 
ping  two-by-four,  with  a  piece  of  rotting  log  for  fulcrum, 
at  the  axle.  Jewel,  I  say,  she  is  deady  Jewel.  Addie  Bun* 
dren  is  dead. 


VARDAMAN 


THEN  1  BEGIN  TO  RUN.  I  RUN  TOWARD  THE  BACK  AND 
come  to  the  edge  of  the  porch  and  stop.  Then  I  be* 
gin  to  cry.  I  can  feel  where  the  fish  was  in  the  dust  It  is 
cut  up  into  pieces  of  not-fish  now,  not-blood  on  my  hands 
and  overalls.  Then  it  wasn't  so.  It  hadn't  happened  then. 
And  now  she  is  getting  so  far  ahead  I  cannot  catch  her. 

The  trees  look  like  chickens  when  they  ruffle  out  into 
the  cool  dust  on  the  hot  days.  If  I  jump  off  the  porch  I 
Will  be  where  the  fish  was,  and  it  all  cut  up  into  not-fish 
now.  I  can  hear  the  bed  and  her  face  and  them  and  I 
can  feel  the  floor  shake  when  he  walks  on  it  that  came 
and  did  it  That  came  and  did  it  when  she  was  all  right 
but  he  came  and  did  it 

"The  fat  son  of  a  bitch.'* 

I  jump  from  the  porch,  running.  The  top  of  the  bam 
comes  swooping  up  out  of  the  twilight  If  I  jump  I  can 
go  through  it  like  the  pink  lady  in  the  circus,  into  the 
warm  smelling,  without  having  to  wait  My  hands  grab 
at  the  bushes;  beneath  my  feet  the  rocks  and  dirt  go  rub^ 
bling  down. 

Then  I  can  breathe  again,  in  the  wscnn  smelling.  I  en- 
ter the  stall,  trying  to  touch,  him,  and  then  I  can  cry 
then  I  vomit  the  crying.  As  soon  as  he  gets  through  kick- 
ing I  can  and  then  I  can  cry,  the  crying  can. 

"He  kilt  her.  He  kilt  her." 

The  life  in  him  runs  under  the  skin,  under  my  h^ficd, 
running  through  the  splotches,  smelling  up  into  my  nose 
where  the  sickness  is  beginning  to  cry,  vomiting  the  cry- 

37* 


!£8     I     LAY     TDYING  377 

ing?  and  then  I  can  breathe,  vomiting  it.  It  makes  a  lot 
of  noise.  I  can  smell  the  life  running  up  from  under  my 
hands,  up  my  arms,  and  then  I  can  leave  the  stall, 

I  cannot  find  it.  In  the  dark,  along  the  dust,  the  walls 
I  cannot  find  it.  The  crying  makes  a  lot  of  noise.  I  wish 
it  wouldn't  make  so  much  noise.  Then  I  find  it  in  the 
wagon-shed,  in  the  dust,  and  I  run  across  the  lot  and  into 
the  road,  the  stick  jouncing  on  my  shoulder. 

They  watch  me  as  I  run  up,  beginning  to  jerk  back3 
their  eyes  rolling,  snorting,  jerking  back  on  the  hitch 
rein.  I  strike.  I  can  hear  the  stick  striking;  I  can  see  it  hit- 
ting their  heads,  the  breast-yoke,  missing  altogether  some- 
times as  they  rear  and  plunge,  but  I  am  glad. 

"You  kilt  my  mawl" 

The  stick  breaks,  they  rearing  and  snorting,  their  feet 
popping  loud  on  the  ground;  loud  because  it  is  going  to 
rain  and  the  air  is  empty  for  the  rain.  But  it  is  still  long 
enough.  I  run  this  way  and  that  as  they  rear  and  jerk  at 
the  hitch-rein,  striking. 

'You  kilt  her!" 

I  strike  at  them,  striking,  they  wheeling  in  a  long  lunge* 
the  buggy  wheeling  on  to  two  wheels  and  motionless  like 
it  is  nailed  to  the  ground  and  the  horses  motionless  like 
they  are  nailed  by  the  hind  feet  to  the  centre  of  a  whirl- 
ing-plate. 

I  run  in  the  dust  I  cannot  see,  running  in  the  sucking 
dust  where  the  buggy  vanishes  tilted  on  two  wheels.  I 
strike,  the  stick  hitting  into  the  ground,  bouncing,  strik- 
ing into  the  dust  and  then  into  the  air  again  and  the  dust 
sucking  on  down  the  road  faster  than  if  a  car  was  in  it* 
And  then  I  can  cry,  looking  at  the  stick.  It  is  broken 
down  to  my  hand,  not  longer  than  stove  wood  that  was 
a  long  stick.  I  throw  it  away  and  I  can  cry.  It  does  ad 
make  so  much  noise  now. 


37°  AS      I     LAY     DYING 

Th**  cow  is  standing  in  the  barn  door,  chewing.  When 
she  sees  me  come  into  the  lot  she  lows,  her  mouth  full  of 
flopping  green,  her  tongue  flopping. 

<CI  ain't  a-goin'  to  milk  you.  I  ain't  a-goin'  to  do  nothing 
for  them/' 

I  hear  her  turn  when  I  pass.  When  I  turn  she  is  just  be- 
hind me  with  her  sweet,  hot,  hard  breath. 

"Didn't  I  tell  you  I  wouldn't?" 

She  nudges  me,  snuffing.  She  moans  deep  inside,  her 
mouth,  closed.  I  jerk  my  hand,  cursing  her  like  Jewel  does. 

"Git,  now." 

I  stoop  my  hand  to  the  ground  and  run  at  her.  She 
jumps  back  and  whirls  away  and  stops,  watching  me. 
She  moans.  She  goes  on  to  the  path  and  stands  there, 
looking  up  the  path. 

It  is  dark  in  die  barn,  warm,  smelling,  silent.  I  can  cry 
quietly,  watching  the  top  of  the  hill. 

Cash  comes  to  the  hill,  limping  where  he  fell  off  of  the 
schurch.  He  looks  down  at  the  spring,  then  up  the  road 
and  back  toward  the  barn.  He  comes  down  the  path 
stiffly  and  looks  at  the  broken  hitch-rein  and  at  the  dust 
in  the  road  and  then  up  the  road,  where  the  dust  is  gone. 

"I  hope  they've  got  clean  past  Tuffs  by  now,  I  so  hope 
bit." 

Cash  turns  and  limps  up  the  path. 

"Dum  him.  I  showed  him.  Durn  him/' 

I  am  not  crying  now.  I  am  not  anything.  Dewey  Dell 
comes  to  the  hill  and  calls  me.  "Vardaman."  I  am  not  any- 
thing. I  am  quiet.  "You,  Vardaman."  I  can  cry  quiet  now, 
feeling  and  hearing  my  tears. 

"Then  bit  want.  Hit  hadn't  happened  then.  Hit  was 
a-layin'  right  there  on  the  ground.  And  now  she's  gittin 
ready  to  cook  hit." 

It  is  dark.  I  can  hear  wood,  silence:  I  know  them.  But 


AS      I     LAY     DYIXG  379 

not  living  sounds,  not  even  him.  It  is  as  though  the  dark 
were  resolving  him  out  of  his  integrity,  into  an  unrelated 
scattering  of  components — snuffings  and  stampings; 
smells  of  cooling  flesh  and  ammoniac  hair;  an  illusion  of 
a  coordinated  whole  of  splotched  hide  and  strong  bones 
within  which,  detached  and  secret  and  familiar,  an  is 
different  from  my  is.  I  see  him  dissolve — legs,  a  rolling 
eye,  a  gaudy  splotching  like  cold  flames — and  float  upon 
the  dark  in  fading  solution;  all  one  yet  neither;  all  either 
yet  none.  I  can  see  hearing  coil  toward  him,  caressing, 
shaping  his  hard  shape — fetlock,  hip,  shoulder  and 
smell  and  sound.  I  am  not  afraid. 
"Cooked  and  et.  Cooked  and  et." 


DEWEY    DELL 


HE  COULD  DO  SO  MUCH  FOR  ME  IF  HE  JUST  WOUOX  HE 
could  do  everything  for  me.  It's  like  everything  in 
the  world  for  me  is  inside  a  tub  full  of  guts,  so  that  you 
wonder  how  there  can  be  any  room  in  it  for  anything 
else  very  important.  He  is  a  big  tub  of  guts  and  I  am  a 
little  tub  of  guts  and  if  there  is  not  any  room  for  anything 
else  important  in  a  big  tub  of  guts,  how  can  it  be  room 
in  a  little  tub  of  guts.  But  I  know  it  is  there  because  God 
gave  women  a  sign  when  something  has  happened  bad, 
It's  because  I  am  alone.  If  I  could  just  feel  it,  it  would 
be  different,  because  I  would  not  be  alone.  But  if  I  were 
not  alone,  everybody  would  know  it.  And  he  could 


380  AS    i    :LAT    DYING 

So  so  much,  for  me,  and  then  I  would  not  be  alone.  Then 
t  could  be  all  right  alone. 

I  would  let  Mm  come  in  between  me  and  Lafe,  like 
Darl  came  in  between  me  and  Laf  e,  and  so  Laf  e  is  alone 
too.  He  is  Lafe  and  I  am  Dewey  Dell,  and  when  mother 
died  I  had  to  go  beyond  and  outside  of  me  and  Lafe  and 
Darl  to  grieve  because  he  could  do  so  much  for  me  and 
he  don't  know  it.  He  don't  even  know  it. 

From  the  back  porch  I  cannot  see  the  barn.  Then  the 
sound  of  Cash's  sawing  comes  in  from  that  way.  It  is 
like  a  dog  outside  the  house,  going  back  and  forth 
around  the  house  to  whatever  door  you  come  to,  waiting 
to  come  in.  He  said  I  worry  more  than  you  do  and  I  said 
You  don't  know  what  worry  is  so  I  can't  worry.  I  try  to 
but  I  can't  think  long  enough  to  worry. 

I  light  the  kitchen  lamp.  The  fish,  cut  into  jagged 
pieces,  bleeds  quietly  in  the  pan.  I  put  it  into  the  cup- 
board quick,  listening  into  the  hall,  hearing.  It  took  her 
ten  days  to  die;  maybe  she  don't  know  it  is  yet.  Maybe 
she  won't  go  until  Cash.  Or  maybe  until  Jewel.  I  take  the 
dish  of  greens  from  the  cupboard  and  the  bread-pan 
from  the  cold  stove,  and  I  stop,  watching  the  door. 

"Where's  Vardaman?"  Cash  says.  In  the  lamp  his  saw- 
dusted  arms  look  like  sand. 

"I  don't  know.  I  ain't  seen  him." 

TPeabody's  team  run  away.  See  if  you  can  find  Varda- 
man.  The  horse  will  let  him  catch  him." 

**Well.  Tell  them  to  come  to  supper." 

I  cannot  see  the  barn.  I  said,  I  don't  know  how  to 
Worry.  I  don't  know  how  to  cry.  I  tried,  but  I  can't.  After 
a  while  the  sound  of  the  saw  comes  around,  coming  dark 
along  the  ground  in  the  dust-dark.  Then  I  can  see  him, 
going  up  and  down  above  the  plank. 

"You  come  in  to  supper/'  I  say.  "Tell  him."  He  could 


AS     I     LAY     DYING 

do  everything  for  me.  And  lie  don't  know  it  He  is  hi& 
guts  and  I  am  my  guts.  And  I  am  Lafe's  guts.  That's  it 
I  don't  see  why  he  didn't  stay  in  town.  We  are  country 
people  not  as  good  as  town  people.  I  don't  see  why  he 
didn't.  Then  I  can  see  the  top  of  the  barn.  The  cow 
stands  at  the  foot  of  the  path,  lowing.  When  I  turn  back, 
Cash  is  gone. 

I  carry  the  buttermilk  in.  Pa  and  Cash  and  he  are  at 
the  table. 

"Where's  that  big  fish  Bud  caught,  sister?'*  he  says. 

I  set  the  milk  on  the  table.  "I  never  had  no  time  to 
cook  it/* 

"Plain  turnip  greens  is  mighty  spindling  eating  for  a 
man  my  size,"  he  says.  Cash  is  eating.  About  his  head 
the  print  of  his  hat  is  sweated  into  his  hair.  His  shirt  is 
blotched  with  sweat.  He  has  not  washed  his  hands  and 
arms. 

"You  ought  to  took  time/'  pa  says.  'Where's  Varda- 
man?" 

I  go  toward  the  door.  "I  can't  find  him/' 

"Here,  sister,"  he  says;  "never  mind  about  the  fish.  ItM 
save,  I  reckon.  Come  on  and  sit  down." 

"I  ain't  minding  it/'  I  say.  Tm  going  to  milk  before  il 
sets  in  to  rain/* 

Pa  helps  himself  and  pushes  the  dish  on.  But  he  does 
not  begin  to  eat.  His  hands  are  half -closed  on  either  side 
of  his  plate,  his  head  bowed  a  little,  his  awry  hair  stand 
ing  into  the  lamplight  He  looks  like  right  after  the  maul 
hits  the  steer  and  it  no  longer  alive  and  don't  yet  know 
that  it  is  dead. 

But  Cash  is  eating,  and  he  is  too.  "You  better  eat 
something/'  he  says.  He  is  looking  at  pa.  "Like  Cash  and 
me.  You'll  need  it/' 

"Ay,"  pa  says.  He  rouses  up,  like  a  steer  that's  been 


3^2  AS     I     X.AY     DYING 

kneeling  In  a  pond  and  you  run  at  it  "She  would  not  be- 
grudge me  it." 

When  I  am  out  of  sight  of  the  house,  I  go  fast  The 
cow  lows  at  the  foot  of  the  bluff.  She  nuzzles  at  me,  snuf- 
fing, blowing  her  breath  in  a  sweet,  hot  blast,  through  my 
dress,  against  my  hot  nakedness,  moaning.  "You  got  to 
wait  a  little  while.  Then  I'll  tend  to  you."  She  follows  me 
into  the  barn  where  I  set  the  bucket  down.  She  breathes 
into  the  bucket,  moaning.  "I  told  you.  You  just  got  to 
wait,  now.  I  got  more  to  do  than  I  can  tend  to."  The  barn 
is  dark.  When  I  pass,  he  kicks  the  wall  a  single  blow.  I  go 
on,  The  broken  plank  is  like  a  pale  plank  standing  on 
end.  Then  I  can  see  the  slope,  feel  the  air  moving  on  my 
face  again,  slow,  pale,  with  lesser  dark  and  with  empty 
seeing,  the  pine  clumps  blotched  up  the  tilted  slope, 
secret  and  waiting. 

The  cow  in  silhouette  against  the  door  nuzzles  at  the 
silhouette  of  the  bucket,  moaning. 

Then  I  pass  the  stall.  I  have  almost  passed  it  I  listen 
to  it  saying  for  a  long  time  before  it  can  say  the  word 
and  the  listening  part  is  afraid  that  there  may  not  be 
time  to  say  it.  I  feel  my  body,  my  bones  and  flesh  begin- 
ning to  part  and  open  upon  the  alone,  and  the  process  of 
coming  unalone  is  terrible.  Lafe.  Lafe.  "Lafe"  Lafe.  Lafe. 
I  lean  a  little  forward,  one  foot  advanced  with  dead 
walking.  I  feel  the  darkness  rushing  past  my  breast,  past 
the  cow;  I  begin  to  rush  upon  the  darkness  but  the  cow 
stops  me  and  the  darkness  rushes  on  upon  the  sweet 
blast  of  her  moaning  breath,  filled  with  wood  and  with 
silence. 

"Vardaman.  You,  Vardaman." 

He  comes  out  of  the  stall  "You  durn  little  sneakl  Yw. 
durn  little  sneak!" 


AS     I     LAY     J)YING 

He  does  not  resist;  the  last  of  rushing  darkness  flees 
whistling  away.  "What?  I  ain't  done  nothing/* 

"You  dum  little  sneak!"  My  hands  shake  him,  hard. 
Maybe  I  couldn't  stop  them.  I  didn't  know  they  could 
shake  so  hard.  They  shake  both  of  us?  shaking. 

"I  never  done  it/*  he  says.  "I  never  touched  them." 

My  hands  stop  shaking  him,  but  I  still  hold  him. 
"What  are  you  doing  here?  Why  didn't  you  answer  when 
I  called  you?" 

"I  ain't  doing  nothing." 

"You  go  on  to  the  house  and  get  your  supper." 

He  draws  back.  I  hold  him.  "You  quit  now.  You  leave 
me  be/* 

<cWhat  were  you  doing  down  here?  You  didn't  come? 
down  here  to  sneak  after  me?" 

"I  never.  I  never.  You  quit,  now.  I  didn't  even  know 
you  was  down  here.  You  leave  me  be." 

I  hold  him,  leaning  down  to  see  his  face,  feel  it  with 
my  eyes.  He  is  about  to  cry.  "Go  on,  now.  I  done  put 
supper  on  and  111  be  there  soon  as  I  milk.  You  better  go 
on  before  he  eats  everything  up.  I  hope  that  team  runs' 
clean  back  to  Jefferson/' 

"He  kilt  her/'  he  says.  He  begins  to  cry. 

"Hush." 

"She  never  hurt  him  and  he  come  and  kilt  her/' 

"Hush."  He  struggles.  I  hold  him.  "Hush/' 

"He  kilt  her/'  The  cow  comes  up  behind  us,  moaning, 
I  shake  him  again. 

"You  stop  it,  now.  Right  this  minute.  You're  fixing  to 
make  yourself  sick  and  then  you  can't  go  to  town.  You 
go  on  to  the  house  and  eat  your  supper." 

"I  don't  want  no  supper.  I  don't  want  to  go  to  town/* 
leave  you  here,  then.  Lessen  you  behave,  we  win 


AS     I     LAY     DYING 

leave  you.  Go  on,  BOW,  before  that  old  green-eating  tub 
of  guts  eats  everything  up  from  you."  He  goes  on,  disap- 
pearing slowly  into  the  hill.  The  crest,  the  trees,  the  roof 
of  the  house  stand  against  the  sky.  The  cow  nuzzles  at 
me,  moaning.  "You'll  just  have  to  wait.  What  you  got  in 
you  ain't  nothing  to  what  I  got  in  me,  even  if  you  are  a 
woman  too."  She  follows  me,  moaning.  Then  the  dead, 
hot,  pale  air  breathes  on  my  face  again.  He  could  fix  it 
all  right,  if  he  just  would.  And  lie  don't  even  know  it.  He 
could  do  everything  for  me  if  he  just  knowed  it.  The  cow 
breathes  upon  my  hips  and  back,  her  breath  warm, 
sweet,  stertorous,  moaning.  The  sky  lies  flat  down  the 
slope,  upon  the  secret  clumps.  Beyond  the  hill  sheet- 
lightning  stains  upward  and  fades*  The  dead  air  shapes 
the  dead  earth,  in  the  dead  darkness,  further  away  than 
seeing  shapes  the  dead  earth.  It  lies  dead  and  warm 
upon  me,  touching  me  naked  through  my  clothes.  I  said 
You  don't  know  what  worry  is.  I  don't  know  what  it  is. 
I  don't  know  whether  I  am  worrying  or  not.  Whether  I 
can  or  not  I  don't  know  whether  I  can  cry  or  not.  I  don't 
know  whether  I  have  tried  to  or  not.  I  feel  like  a  wet 
seed  wild  in  the  hot  blind  earth. 


VARDAMAN 


WHEN  THEY  GET  IT  FINISHED  THEY  ABE  GOING  TO  PUT 
her  in  it  and  then  for  a  long  time  I  couldn't  say  it. 
I  saw  the  dark  stand  up  and  go  whirling  away  and  I  said 
"Are  you  going  to  nail  her  up  in  it,  Cash?  Cash?  Cash?"  I 


AS     I     LAY     DYING 

got  shut  up  In  the  crib  the  new  door  it  was  too  heavy 
for  me  it  went  shut  I  couldn't  breathe  because  the  rat 
was  breathing  up  all  the  air.  I  said  "Are  you  going  to  nail 
it  shut,  Cash?  Nail  it?  Nail  it?" 

Pa  walks  around.  His  shadow  walks  around,  over  Cash 
going  up  and  down  above  the  saw,  at  the  bleeding 
plank. 

Dewey  Dell  said  we  will  get  some  bananas.  The  train 
is  behind  the  glass,  red  on  the  track.  When  it  runs  the 
track  shines  on  and  off.  Pa  said  flour  and  sugar  and  coffee 
costs  so  much.  Because  I  am  a  country  boy  because  boys 
in  town.  Bicycles.  Why  do  flour  and  sugar  and  coffee  cost 
so  much  when  he  is  a  country  boy.  "Wouldn't  you  rather 
have  some  bananas  instead?"  Bananas  are  gone,  eatent 
Gone.  When  it  runs  on  the  track  shines  again.  "Why  ain't 
I  a  town  boy,  pa?"  I  said  God  made  me.  I  did  not  said 
to  God  to  made  me  in  the  country.  If  He  can  make  the 
train,  why  can't  He  make  them  all  in  the  town  because 
flour  and  sugar  and  coffee.  "Wouldn't  you  ruther  have 
bananas?" 

He  walks  around.  His  shadow  walks  around. 

It  was  not  her.  I  was  there,  looking.  I  saw.  I  thought 
it  was  her,  but  it  was  not.  It  was  not  my  mother.  She 
went  away  when  the  other  one  laid  down  in  her  bed  and 
drew  the  quilt  up.  She  went  away.  "Did  she  go  as  far  as 
town?"  "She  went  farther  than  town."  "Did  all  those  rab- 
bits and  possums  go  farther  than  town?"  God  made  the 
rabbits  and  possums.  He  made  the  train.  Why  must  He 
make  a  different  place  for  them  to  go  if  she  is  just  like  the 
rabbit. 

Pa  walks  around.  His  shadow  does.  The  saw  sounds 
like  it  is  asleep. 

And  so  i£  Cash  nails  the  box  up,  she  is  not  a  rabbit, 
and  so  if  she  is  not  a  rabbit  I  couldn't  breathe  in  the 


AS      I      LAY      DYING 

crib  and  Cash,  is  going  to  nail  it  up.  And  so  if  she  lets 
him  it  is  not  her.  I  know.  I  was  there.  I  saw  when  it  did 
not  be  her.  I  saw.  They  think  it  is  and  Cash  is  going  to 
nail  it  up. 

It  was  not  her  because  it  was  laying  right  yonder  in 
the  dirt.  And  now  it's  all  chopped  up.  I  chopped  it  up. 
It's  laying  in  the  kitchen  in  the  bleeding  pan,  waiting  to 
be  cooked  and  et.  Then  it  wasn't  and  she  was,  and  now 
it  is  and  she  wasn't  And  tomorrow  it  will  be  cooked  and 
et  and  she  will  be  him  and  pa  and  Cash  and  Dewey  Dell 
and  there  won't  be  anything  in  the  box  and  so  she  can 
breathe.  It  was  laying  right  yonder  on  the  ground.  I  can 
get  Vernon.  He  was  there  and  he  seen  it,  and  with  both 
of  us  it  wiU  be  and  then  it  will  not  be. 


TULL 


IT  WAS  NIGH  TO  MIDNIGHT  AND  IT  HAD  SET  IN  TO  RAIN 
when  he  woke  us.  It  had  been  a  misdoubtful  night, 
with  the  storm  making;  a  night  when  a  fellow  looks  for 
most  anything  to  happen  before  he  can  get  the  stock  fed 
and  himself  to  the  house  an  supper  et  and  in  bed  with  the 
rain  starting,  and  when  Peabody's  team  come  up,  lath- 
ered, with  the  broke  harness  dragging  and  the  neck-yoke 
betwixt  the  off  critter's  legs,  Cora  says  "It's  Addie  Bun- 
dren.  She's  gone  at  last" 

"Peabody  mought  have  been  to  ere  a  one  of  a  dozen 
houses  hereabouts,"  I  says.  "Besides,  how  do  you  know 
it's  Peabody's  team?" 


AS     I     LAY     DYING 

'Well,  ain't  it?"  she  says.  "You  hitch  up,  now.'7 

"What  for?"  I  says.  "If  she  is  gone,  we  can't  do  nothing 
till  morning.  And  it  fixing  to  storm  too. 

"It's  my  duty/*  she  says.  "You  put  the  team  in." 

But  I  wouldn't  do  it.  "It  stands  to  reason  they'd  send 
for  us  if  they  needed  us.  You  don't  even  know  she's  gone 
yet." 

"Why,  don't  you  know  that's  Peabody's  team?  Do  you 
( claim  it  ain't?  Well,  then."  But  I  wouldn't  go.  When  folks 
wants  a  fellow,  it's  best  to  wait  till  they  sends  for  him, 
I've  found.  "It's  my  Christian  duty,"  Cora  says,  "Will 
you  stand  between  me  and  my  Christian  duty?" 

"You  can  stay  there  all  day  tomorrow,  if  you  want/*  I 
says. 

So  when  Cora  waked  me  it  had  set  in  to  rain.  Even 
while  I  was  going  to  the  door  with  the  lamp  and  it  shin- 
ing on  the  glass  so  he  could  see  I  am  coming,  it  kept  on 
knocking.  Not  loud,  but  steady,  like  he  might  have  gone 
to  sleep  thumping,  but  I  never  noticed  how  low  down 
on  the  door  the  knocking  was  till  I  opened  it  and  never 
seen  nothing.  I  held  the  lamp  up,  with  the  rain  sparkling 
across  it  and  Cora  back  in  the  hall  saying  "Who  is  it,  Ver- 
non?"  but  I  couldn't  see  nobody  a-tall  at  first  until  I 
looked  down  and  around  the  door,  lowering  the  lamp. 

He  looked  like  a  drowned  puppy,  in  them  overalls, 
without  no  hat,  splashed  up  to  his  knees  where  he  had 
walked  them  four  miles  in  die  mud.  'Well,  I'll  be 
durned/'  I  says. 

"Who  is  it,  Vernon?"  Cora  says. 

He  looked  at  me,  his  eyes  round  and  black  in  the 
die  like  when  you  throw  a  light  in  a  owl's  face. 
mind  that  ere  fish/'  he  says. 

"Come  in  the  house,"  I  says.  "What  is  it?  Is  your 


AS      I     LAY     DYING 

csVemon/5  Cora  says. 

He  stood  kind  of  around  behind  the  door,  in  the  dark 
The  rain  was  blowing  on  to  the  lamp,  hissing  on  it  so  1 
am  scared  every  minute  it'll  break.  "You  was  there/"  he 
says.  "You  seen  it.'* 

Then  Cora  come  to  the  door.  "You  come  right  in  outen 
the  rain/*  she  says,  pulling  him  in  and  him  watching  me. 
He  looked  Just  like  a  drowned  puppy.  <£l  told  you/'  Cora 
says.  **I  told  you  it  was  a-happening.  You  go  and  hitch/' 

TBut  he  ain't  said "  I  says. 

He  looked  at  me,  dripping  on  to  the  floor.  "He's  a-ruin- 
ing  the  rug/'  Cora  says.  "Ton  go  get  the  team  while  I  take 
him  to  the  kitchen." 

But  he  hung  back,  dripping,  watching  me  with  them 
eyes.  *Tou  was  there.  You  seen  it  laying  there.  Cash  is 
fixing  to  nail  her  up?  and  it  was  a-laying  right  there  on 
the  ground.  You  seen  it.  You  seen  the  mark  in  the  dirt. 
The  rain  never  come  up  till  after  I  was  a-coming  here.  So 
we  can  get  back  in  time." 

I  be  durn  if  it  didn't  gi\re  me  the  creeps,  even  when  I 
didn't  know  yet  But  Cora  did.  "You  get  that  team  quick 
as  you  can/'  she  says,  "He's  outen  his  head  with  grief  and 
worry." 

I  be  durn  if  it  didn*t  give  me  the  creeps.  Now  and 
then  a  fellow  gets  to  thinking.  About  all  the  sorrow  and 
afflictions  in  this  world;  how  it's  liable  to  strike  any- 
where, like  lightning.  I  reckon  it  does  take  a  powerful 
trust  in  the  Lord  to  guard  a  fellow,  though  sometimes  I 
think  that  Cora's  a  mite  over-cautious,  like  she  was  trying 
to  crowd  the  other  folks  away  and  get  in  closer  than  any- 
body else.  But  then,  when  something  like  this  happens, 
I  reckon  she  is  right  and  you  got  to  keep  after  it  and  I 
reckon  I  am  blessed  in  having  a  wife  that  ever  strives  for 
sanctity  and  well-doing  like  she  says  I  am. 


AS     I     LAY     DYIXG 

Now  and  then  a  fellow  gets  to  thinking  about  it.  Not 
often,  though.  Which  is  a  good  thing.  For  the  Lord 
aimed  for  him  to  do  and  not  to  spend  too  much  time 
thinking,  because  his  brain  if s  like  a  piece  of  machinery: 
it  won't  stand  a  whole  lot  of  racking.  It's  best  when 
it  all  runs  along  the  same,  doing  the  day's  work  and  not 
no  one  part  used  no  more  than  needful.  I  have  said  and 
I  say  again,  that's  ever  living  thing  the  matter  with  Darl: 
he  just  thinks  by  himself  too  much.  Cora's  right  when 
she  says  all  he  needs  is  a  wife  to  straighten  him  out  And 
when  I  think  about  that,  I  think  that  if  nothing  but  be- 
ing married  will  help  a  man,  he's  dum  nigh  hopeless.  But 
I  reckon  Cora's  right  when  she  says  the  reason  the  Lord 
had  to  create  women  is  because  man  don't  know  his  own 
good  when  he  sees  it. 

When  I  come  back  to  the  house  with  the  team,  they 
was  in  the  kitchen.  She  was  dressed  on  top  of  her  night* 
gown  with  a  shawl  over  her  head  and  her  umbrella  and 
her  Bible  wrapped  up  in  the  oilcloth,  and  him  sitting  on 
a  up-turned  bucket  on  the  stove-zinc  where  she  had  put 
him,  dripping  on  to  the  floor.  "I  can't  get  nothing  outen 
him  except  about  a  fish/'  she  says.  "It's  a  judgment  on 
them.  I  see  the  hand  of  the  Lord  upon  this  boy  for  Anse 
Bundren's  judgment  and  warning." 

*TThe  rain  never  come  up  till  after  I  left,"  he  says.  TE 
had  done  left.  I  was  on  the  way.  And  so  it  was  there  in 
the  dust.  You  seen  it.  Cash  is  fixing  to  nail  her,  but  you 
seen  it." 

When  we  got  there  is  was  raining  hard,  and  him  sitting 
on  the  seat  between  us,  wrapped  up  in  Cora's  shawl.  He 
hadn't  said  nothing  else,  just  sitting  there  with  Cora  holl- 
ing  the  umbrella  over  him.  Now  and  then  Cora  would 
stop  singing  long  enough  to  say  "It's  a  judgment  on  Anse 
Bundren.  May  it  show  Mm  the  path  of  sin  he  is  a-hrod- 


39°  AS     I     LAY      DYING 

ding/'  Then  she  would  sing  again,  and  him  sitting  there 
between  us,  leaning  forward  a  little  like  the  mules 
couldn't  go  fast  enough  to  suit  him. 

"It  was  laying  right  yonder/*  he  says,  "but  the  rain 
come  up  after  I  taken  and  left.  So  I  can  go  and  open 
the  windows,  because  Cash  ain't  nailed  her  yet" 

It  was  long  a-past  midnight  when  we  drove  the  last 
nail,  and  almost  dust-dawn  when  I  got  back  home  and 
taken  the  team  out  and  got  back  in  bed,  with  Cora's 
nightcap  laying  on  the  other  pillow.  And  be  durned  if 
even  then  it  wasn't  like  I  could  still  hear  Cora  singing 
and  feel  that  boy  leaning  forward  between  us  like  he  was 
ahead  of  the  mules,  and  still  see  Cash  going  up  and 
down  with  that  saw,  and  Anse  standing  there  like  a  scare- 
crow, Mke  he  was  a  steer  standing  knee-deep  in  a  pond 
and  somebody  come  by  and  set  the  pond  up  on  edge 
and  he  ain't  missed  it  yet. 

It  was  nigh  toward  daybreak  when  we  drove  the  last 
nail  and  toted  it  into  the  house,  where  she  was  laying  on 
the  bed  with  the  window  open  and  the  rain  blowing  on 
her  again.  Twice  he  did  it,  and  him  so  dead  for  sleep 
that  Cora  says  his  face  looked  like  one  of  these  here 
Christmas  masts  that  had  done  been  buried  a  while  and 
then  dug  up,  until  at  last  they  put  her  into  it  and  nailed 
it  down  so  he  couldn't  open  the  window  on  her  no  more. 
And  the  next  morning  they  found  him  in  his  shirt-tail 
laying  asleep  on  the  floor  like  a  felled  steer,  and  the  top 
of  the  box  bored  clean  full  of  holes  and  Cash's  new  auger 
broke  off  in  the  last  one.  When  they  taken  the  lid  off  her 
they  found  that  two  of  them  had  bored  on  into  her  face. 

If  it's  a  judgment,  it  ain't  right.  Because  the  Lord's 
got  more  to  do  than  that.  He's  bound  to  have.  Because 
the  only  burden  Anse  Bundren's  ever  had  is  himself.  And 


AS     I     LAY     DYING  391 

when  follcs  talks  him  low,  I  think  to  myself  he  ain't  that 
less  of  a  man  or  he  couldn't  a  bore  himself  this  long. 

It  ain't  right.  I  be  dura  if  it  is.  Because  He  said  Suffet 
little  children  to  come  unto  Me  don't  make  it  right, 
neither.  Cora  said,  "I  have  bore  you  what  the  Lord  God 
sent  me.  I  faced  it  without  fear  nor  terror  because  my 
faith  was  strong  in  the  Lord,  a-bolstering  and  sustaining 
me.  If  you  have  no  son,  it's  because  the  Lord  has  decreed 
otherwise  in  His  wisdom.  And  my  life  is  and  has  ever 
been  a  open  book  to  ere  a  man  or  woman  among  His 
creatures  because  I  trust  in  my  God  and  my  reward." 

I  reckon  she's  right.  I  reckon  if  there's  ere  a  man  or 
woman  anywhere  that  He  could  turn  it  all  over  to  and  go 
away  with  His  mind  at  rest,  it  would  be  Cora.  And  I 
reckon  she  would  make  a  few  changes,  no  matter  how  He 
was  running  it.  And  I  reckon  they  would  be  for  man's 
good.  Leastways,  we  would  have  to  like  them.  Leastways, 
we  might  as  well  go  on  and  make  like  we  did. 


DARL 


THE  LANTERN  SITS  ON  A  STUMP.  RUSTED,  GREASE-FOXJLED5 
its  cracked  chimney  smeared  on  one  side  with  a  soar- 
ing smudge  of  soot,  it  sheds  a  feeble  and  sultry  glare 
upon  the  trestles  and  the  boards  and  the  adjacent  earth. 
Upon  the  dark  ground  the  chips  look  like  random  smears 
of  soft  pale  paint  on  a  black  canvas.  The  boards  look 


AS     I     LAY      DYIXG 

like  long  smooth  tatters  torn  from  the  flat  darkness  and 
turned  backside  out. 

Cash  labours  about  the  trestles,  moving  back  and 
forth,  lifting  and  placing  the  planks  with  long  clattering 
reverberations  in  the  dead  air  as  though  he  were  lifting 
and  dropping  them  at  the  bottom  of  an  invisible  well, 
the  sounds  ceasing  without  departing,  as  if  any  move- 
ment might  dislodge  them  from  the  immediate  air  in 
reverberant  repetition.  He  saws  again,  his  elbow  flashing 
slowly,  a  thin  thread  of  fire  running  along  the  edge  of 
the  saw,  lost  and  recovered  at  the  top  and  bottom  of 
each  stroke  in  unbroken  elongation,  so  that  the  saw  ap- 
pears to  be  six  feet  long,  into  and  out  of  pa's  shabby  and 
aimless  silhouette.  "Give  me  that  plank,"  Cash  says.  "No; 
the  other  one/'  He  puts  the  saw  down  and  comes  and 
picks  up  the  plank  he  wants,  sweeping  pa  away  with 
the  long  swinging  gleam  of  the  balanced  board. 

The  air  smells  like  sulphur.  Upon  the  impalpable 
plane  of  it  their  shadows  form  as  upon  a  wall,  as  though 
like  sound  they  had  not  gone  very  far  away  in  falling 
but  had  merely  congealed  for  a  moment,  immediate  and 
musing.  Cash  works  on,  half  turned  into  the  feeble  light, 
one  thigh  and  one  pole-thin  arm  braced,  his  face  sloped 
into  the  light  with  a  rapt,  dynamic  immobility  above 
his  tireless  elbow.  Below  the  sky  sheet-lightning  slum- 
bers lightly;  against  it  the  trees,  motionless,  are  ruffled 
out  to  the  last  twig,  swollen,  increased  as  though  quick 
With  young. 

It  begins  to  rain.  The  first  harsh,  sparse,  swift  drops 
,rush  through  the  leaves  and  across  the  ground  in  a  long 
sigh,  as  though  of  relief  from  intolerable  suspense.  They 
are  big  as  buckshot,  warm  as  though  fired  from  a  gun; 
they  sweep  across  the  lantern  in  a  vicious  hissing.  Pa 
lifts  his  face,  slack-mouthed,  the  wet  black  rim  of  snuff 


AS     I     JLAY     DYING  393 

plastered  close  along  the  base  of  Ms  gums;  from  behind 
his  slack-faced  astonishment  he  muses  as  though  from 
beyond  time,  upon  the  ultimate  outrage.  Cash  looks  once 
at  the  sky,  then  at  the  lantern.  The  saw  has  not  faltered, 
the  running  gleam  of  its  pistoning  edge  unbroken.  "Gel 
something  to  cover  the  lantern/'  he  says. 

Pa  goes  to  the  house.  The  rain  rushes  suddenly  down, 
without  thunder,  without  warning  of  any  sort;  he  is 
swept  on  to  the  porch  upon  the  edge  of  it  and  in  an 
instant  Cash  is  wet  to  the  skin.  Yet  the  motion  of  the 
saw  has  not  faltered,  as  though  it  and  the  arm  functioned 
in  a  tranquil  conviction  that  rain  was  an  illusion  of  the 
mind.  Then  he  puts  down  the  saw  and  goes  and  crouches 
above  the  lantern,  shielding  it  with  his  body,  his  back 
shaped  lean  and  scrawny  by  his  wet  shirt  as  though  he 
had  been  abruptly  turned  wrong-side  out,  shirt  and  all 

Pa  returns.  He  is  wearing  Jewel's  raincoat  and  carrying 
Dewey  Dell's,  Squatting  over  the  lantern,  Cash  reaches 
back  and  picks  up  four  sticks  and  drives  them  into  the 
earth  and  takes  Dewey  DeE's  raincoat  from  pa  and 
spreads  it  over  the  sticks,  forming  a  roof  above  the  lan- 
tern. Pa  watches  him.  "I  don't  know  what  you'll  do,"  he 
says.  "Darl  taken  his  coat  with  him/' 

"Get  wet,"  Cash  says.  He  takes  up  the  saw  again; 
again  it  moves  up  and  down,  in  and  out  of  that  unhurried 
imperviousness  as  a  piston  moves  in  the  oil;  soaked, 
scrawny,  tireless,  with  tihe  lean  light  body  of  a  boy  of 
an  old  man.  Pa  watches  him,  bMnking,  Ms  face  sireara- 
ing;  again  he  looks  up  at  the  sky  with  that  expression 
of  dumb  and  brooding  outrage  and  yet  of  vindication,, 
as  though  he  had  expected  no  less;  now  and  then  he 
stirs,  moves,  gaunt  and  streaming,  picking  up  a  board 
or  a  tool  and  then  laying  it  down.  Vernon  TuU  is  there 
now,  and  Cash  is  wearing  Mrs*  Tolls  raincoat  and  he 


394  AS     I     LAY     DYING 

and  Veraon  are  hunting  the  saw.  After  a  while  they  Bud 
it  in  pa's  hand. 

"Why  don't  you  go  on  to  the  house,  out  of  the  rain?" 
Cash  says.  Pa  looks  at  him.,  his  face  streaming  slowly. 
It  is  as  though  upon  a  face  carved  by  a  savage  carica- 
turist a  monstrous  burlesque  of  all  bereavement  flowed. 
"You  go  on  in/*  Cash  says.  "Me  and  Vernon  can  finish 
it/' 

Pa  looks  at  them.  The  sleeves  of  Jewel's  coat  are  too 
short  for  him.  Upon  his  face  the  rain  streams,  slow  as 
cold  glycerine.  "I  don't  begrudge  her  the  wetting/'  he 
says.  He  moves  again  and  falls  to  shifting  the  planks, 
picking  them  up,  laying  them  down  again  carefully,  as 
though  they  are  glass.  He  goes  to  die  lantern  and  pulls 
at  the  propped  raincoat  until  he  knocks  it  down  and 
Cash  comes  and  fixes  it  back. 

"You  get  on  to  the  house/'  Cash  says.  He  leads  pa 
to  the  house  and  returns  with  the  raincoat  and  folds  it 
and  places  it  beneath  the  shelter  where  the  lantern  sits, 
Vernon  has  not  stopped.  He  looks  up,  still  sawing. 

"You  ought  to  done  that  at  first/'  he  says.  "You  knowed 
It  was  fixing  to  rain/' 

"It's  his  fever,"  Cash  says.  He  looks  at  the  board. 

"Ay/'  Vernon  says.  "He'd  a  come,  anyway/' 

Cash  squints  at  the  board.  On  the  long  flank  of  it  the 
rain  crashes  steadily,  myriad,  fluctuant.  "I'm  going  to 
bevel  it,"  he  says. 

"It'll  take  more  time,"  Vernon  says.  Cash  sets  the 
plank  on  edge;  a  moment  longer  Vernon  watches  him, 
then  he  hands  him  the  plane. 

Vernon  holds  the  board  steady  while  Cash  bevels  the 
edge  of  it  with  the  tedious  and  minute  care  of  a  jew- 
eller. Mrs.  Tull  comes  to  the  edge  of  the  porch  and  calls 
Veraon.  "How  near  are  you  done?"  she  says. 


AS     I     LAY     DYING  395 

Vemon  does  not  look  up.  "Not  long.  Some,  yet.** 

She  watches  Cash  stooping  at  the  plank,  the  turgid 
savage  gleam  of  the  lantern  slicking  on  the  raincoat  as 
he  moves.  "You  go  down  and  get  some  planks  off  the 
barn  and  finish  it  and  come  in  out  of  the  rain/'  she  says, 
"You'll  both  catch  your  death."  Vemon  does  not  move. 
''Vernon/'  she  says. 

"We  won't  be  long,"  he  says.  "Well  be  done  after  a 
spell.'*  Mrs.  Tull  watches  them  a  while.  Then  she  re- 
enters  the  house. 

"If  we  get  in  a  tight,  we  could  take  some  of  them 
planks,"  Vernon  says.  "I'll  help  you  put  them  back." 

Cash  ceases  the  plane  and  squints  along  the  plank,, 
wiping  it  with  his  palm.  "Give  me  the  next  one/*  he 
says. 

Some  time  toward  dawn  the  rain  ceases.  But  it  is  not 
yet  day  when  Cash  drives  the  last  nail  and  stands  stiffly 
up  and  looks  down  at  the  finished  coffin,  the  others 
watching  him.  In  the  lantern-light  his  face  is  calm,  mus 
ing;  slowly  he  strokes  his  hands  on  his  raincoat  thighs 
in  a  gesture  deliberate,  final  and  composed.  Then  the 
four  of  them — Cash  and  pa  and  Vernon  and  Peabody 
— raise  the  coffin  to  their  shoulders  and  turn  toward  the 
house.  It  is  light,  yet  they  move  slowly;  empty,  yet  they 
carry  it  carefully;  lif eless,  yet  they  move  with  husheJ 
precautionary  words  to  one  another,  speaking  of  it  as 
though,  complete,  it  now  slumbered  lightly  alive,  wait- 
ing to  come  awake.  On  the  dark  floor  their  feet  clump 
awkwardly,  as  though  for  a  long  time  they  have  not 
walked  on  floors. 

They  set  it  down  by  the  bed.  Peabody  says  quietly: 
"Let's  eat  a  snack.  It's  almost  daylight.  Where's  Cash?* 

He  has  returned  to  the  trestles,  stooped  again  in  the 
lantern's  feeble  glare  as  he  gathers  up  his  tools  and 


AS     I     LAY     DYIISTG 

wipes  them  on  a  cloth  carefully  and  puts  them  into  the 
box  with  its  leather  sling  to  go  over  the  shoulder.  Then 
he  takes  up  box,  lantern  and  raincoat  and  returns  to  the 
house,  mounting  the  steps  into  faint  silhouette  against 
the  paling  east. 

In  a  strange  room  you  must  empty  yourself  for  sleep. 
And  before  you  are  emptied  for  sleep,  what  are  you. 
And  when  you  are  emptied  for  sleep,  you  are  not.  And 
when  you  are  filled  with  sleep,  you  never  were.  I  don't 
know  what  I  am.  I  don't  know  if  I  am  or  not.  Jewel 
knows  he  is,  because  he  does  not  know  that  he  does  not 
know  whether  he  is  or  not.  He  cannot  empty  himself 
for  sleep  because  lie  is  not  what  lie  is  and  he  is  what 
he  is  not.  Beyond  the  unlamped  wall  I  can  hear  the 
rain  shaping  the  wagon  that  is  ours,  the  load  that  is 
no  longer  theirs  that  felled  and  sawed  it  nor  yet  theirs 
that  bought  it  and  which  is  not  ours  either,  lie  on  our 
wagon  though  it  does,  since  only  the  wind  and  the  rain 
shape  it  only  to  Jewel  and  me,  that  are  not  asleep.  And 
since  sleep  is  is-not  and  rain  and  wind  are  was,  it  is  not. 
Yet  the  wagon  is?  because  when  the  wagon  is  was,  Addie 
Bundren  will  not  be.  And  Jewel  is,  so  Addie  Bundrea 
must  be.  And  then  I  must  be,  or  I  could  not  empty  my- 
relf  for  sleep  in  a  strange  room.  And  so  if  I  am  not 
emptied  yet,  1  am  is. 

How  often  have  I  lain  beneath  rain  on  a  strange  roof, 
thinking  of  home. 


I 


CASH 


MADE  IT  ON  THE  BEVEL. 

1.  There  is  more  surface  for  the  nails  to  grip. 

2.  There  is  twice  the  gripping-surface  to  each  seam, 

3.  The  water  will  have  to  seep  into  it  on  a  slant 
Water  moves   easiest  up  and  down  or  straight 

across. 

4.  In  a  house  people  are  upright  two-thirds  of  the 
time.  So  the  seams  and  joints  are  made  up-and- 
down.  Because  the  stress  is  up-and-down. 

5.  In  a  bed  where  people  lie  down  all  the  time,  the 
joints  and  seams  are  made  sideways,  because  the 
stress  is  sideways. 

8.  Except. 

7.  A  body  is  not  square  like  a  cross-tie. 

8.  Animal  magnetism. 

9.  The  animal  magnetism  of  a  dead  body  makes  the 
stress  come  slanting,  so  the  seams  and  joints  of  a 
coffin  are  made  on  the  bevel. 

10.  You  can  see  by  an  old  grave  that  the  earth  sinks 
down  on  the  bevel. 

11.  While  in  a  natural  hole  it  sinks  by  the  centre,  the 

stress  being  up-and-down, 

12.  So  I  made  it  on  the  bevel 

13.  It  makes  a  neater  job. 


397 


VARDAMAN 


M 


Y  MOTHER  IS  A  F35BL 


TULL 


IT  WAS  TEN  O'CLOCK  WHEN  I  GOT  BACK,  WTTH  FEABODY's 
team  hitched  on  to  the  back  of  the  wagon.  They  had 
already  dragged  the  buckboard  back  from  where  Quick 
found  it  upside  down  straddle  of  the  ditch  about  a  mile 
from  the  spring.  It  was  pulled  out  of  the  road  at  the 
spring,  and  about  a  dozen  wagons  was  already  there. 
It  was  Quick  found  it.  He  said  tie  river  was  up  and  still 
rising.  He  said  it  had  already  covered  the  highest  water- 
mark on  the  bridge-piling  he  had  ever  seen.  "That  bridge 
won't  stand  a  whole  lot  of  water/'  I  said.  "Has  somebody 
told  Anse  about  it?" 

"I  told  him,"  Quick  said.  "He  says  he  reckons  them 
boys  has  heard  and  unloaded  and  are  on  the  way  back 
by  now.  He  says  they  can  load  up  and  get  across." 

"He  better  go  on  and  bury  her  at  New  Hope/'  Arm- 
stid  said.  'That  bridge  is  old.  I  wouldn't  monkey  with 
it." 


AS    I    LAY     DYING  395? 

"His  mind  is  set  on  taking  her  to  Jefferson/*  Quick 
said. 

"Then  he  better  get  at  it  soon  as  he  can,"  Armstid 
said. 

Anse  meets  us  at  the  door.  He  has  shaved,  but  not 
good.  There  is  a  long  cut  on  his  jaw,  and  he  is  wearing 
his  Sunday  pants  and  a  white  shirt  with  the  neckband 
buttoned.  It  is  drawn  smooth  over  his  hump,  making  it 
look  bigger  than  ever,  like  a  white  shirt  will,  and  his 
face  is  different  too.  He  looks  folks  in  the  eye  now,  digni- 
fied, his  face  tragic  and  composed,  shaking  us  by  the 
hand  as  we  walk  up  on  to  the  porch  and  scrape  our 
shoes,  a  little  stiff  in  our  Sunday  clothes,  our  Sunday 
clothes  rustling,  not  looking  full  at  him  as  he  meets  us, 

"The  Lord  giveth/'  we  say. 

"The  Lord  giveth." 

That  boy  is  not  there.  Peabody  told  about  how  he 
come  into  the  kitchen,  hollering,  swarming  and  claw- 
ing at  Cora  when  he  found  her  cooking  that  fish,  and 
how  Dewey  Dell  taken  him  down  to  the  bam.  "My 
team  all  right?"  Peabody  says. 

"All  right/'  I  tell  him.  "I  give  them  a  bait  this  morn- 
ing. Your  buggy  seems  all  riglit  too.  It  ain't  hurt." 

"And  no  fault  of  somebody's/'  he  says.  "I'd  give  a 
nickel  to  know  where  that  boy  was  when  that  teanii 
broke  away." 

"If  it's  broke  anywhere,  III  fix  it,"  I  say. 

The  women  folks  go  on  into  the  house.  We  can  hear 
them,  talking  and  fanning.  The  fans  go  whish,  whish, 
whish  and  them  talking,  the  talking  sounding  kind  of 
like  bees  murmuring  in  a  water-bucket.  The  men  stop 
on  the  porch,  talking  some,  not  looking  at  one  another, 

"Howdy,  Vernon/'  they  say.  "Howlyv  Tull." 

"Looks  like  more  rain/* 


40°  AS     I     LAY     DYING 

It  does  for  a  fact'* 

"Yes,  sir.  It  will  rain  some  more.*9 

"It  come  up  quick/* 

"And  going  away  slow.  It  don't  fail." 

I  go  around  to  the  back.  Cash  is  filling  up  the  holes 
fie  bored  in  the  top  of  it.  He  is  trimming  oat  pings  for 
them,  one  at  a  time,  the  wood  wet  and  hard  to  work. 
He  could  cut  up  a  tin  can  and  hide  the  holes  and  no- 
body wouldn't  know  the  difference.  Wouldn't  mind,, 
anyway.  I  have  seen  him  spend  a  hour  trimming  out 
a  wedge  like  it  was  glass  he  was  working,  when  he 
could  have  reached  around  and  picked  up  a  dozen 
sticks  and  drove  them  into  the  joint  and  made  it  do. 

When  we  finished  I  go  back  to  the  front.  The  men 
have  gone  a  little  piece  from  the  house,  sitting  on  the 
mds  of  the  boards  and  on  the  saw-horses  where  we 
made  it  last  night,  some  sitting  and  some  squatting. 
Whitfield  ain*t  come  yet. 

They  look  up  at  me,  their  eyes  asking. 

"It's  about/'  I  say.  "He's  ready  to  nail." 

While  they  are  getting  up  Anse  conies  to  the  door 
and  looks  at  us  and  we  return  to  the  porch.  We  scrape 
our  shoes  again,  careful,  waiting  for  one  another  to  go 
in  first,  milling  a  little  at  the  door.  Anse  stands  inside 
the  door,  dignified,  composed.  He  waves  us  in  and  leads 
the  way  into  the  room. 

They  had  laid  her  in  it  reversed.  Cash  made  it  clock- 
shape,  like  this  jr**8**^^  with,  every  joint  and  seam 
bevelled  and  'U*,,^*^^  scrubbed  with  the  plane, 
tight  as  a  drum  and  neat  as  a  sewing  basket,  and  they 
had  laid  her  in  it  head  to  foot  so  it  wouldn't  crush  her 
dress.  It  was  her  wedding  dress  and  it  had  a  flare-out  bot- 
tom, and  they  had  laid  her  head  to  foot  in  it  so  the  dress 
could  spread  out,  and  they  had  made  her  a  veil  out  of 


AS     I     LAY     DYING  40! 

a  mosquito  bar  so  the  auger  holes  in  her  face  wouldn't 
show. 

When  we  are  going  out,  Whitfield  comes.  He  is  wet 
and  muddy  to  the  waist,  coining  in.  "The  Lord  comfort 
this  house,"  he  says.  "I  was  late  because  the  bridge  has 
gone.  I  went  down  to  the  old  ford  and  swum  my  horse 
over,  the  Lord  protecting  me.  His  grace  be  upon  this 
house." 

We  go  back  to  the  trestles  and  plank-ends  and  sit  or 
squat. 

"I  knowed  it  would  go,"  Armstid  says. 

"It's  been  there  a  long  time,  that  ere  bridge,**  Quick 
says. 

The  Lord  has  kept  it  there,  you  mean,"  Uncle  Billy 
says.  "I  don't  know  ere  a  man  that's  touched  hammer  to 
it  in  twenty-five  years/* 

"How  long  has  it  been  there,  Uncle  Billy?"  Quick  says. 

"It  was  built  in  ...  let  me  see  ...  It  was  in  the  year 
1888,"  Uncle  Billy  says.  TE  mind  it  because  the  first  man 
to  cross  it  was  Peabody  coming  to  my  house  when  Jody 
was  born." 

"If  I'd  crossed  it  every  time  your  wife  littered  since, 
it'd  a  been  wore  out  long  before  this,  Billy/'  Peabody 
says. 

We  laugh,  suddenly  loud,  then  suddenly  quiet  again, 
We  look  a  little  aside  at  one  another. 

"Lots  of  folks  has  crossed  it  that  won't  cross  no  more 
bridges/'  Houston  says. 

"It's  a  fact/'  Littlejohn  says.  "It's  so/' 

"One  more  ain't,  no  ways,"  Armstid  says.  "It'd  taken 
them  two-three  days  to  got  her  to  town  in  the  wagon. 
They'd  be  gone  a  week,  getting  her  to  Jefferson  and 
back." 


AS     I     LAY     D 

"What's  Anse  so  itching  to  take  her  to  Jefferson  for, 
anyway?"  Houston  says. 

"He  promised  her,"  I  say,  "She  wanted  it.  She  come 
from  there.  Her  mind  was  set  on  it/* 

"And  Anse  is  set  on  it,  too,"  Quick  says. 

"Ay,"  Uncle  Billy  says,  "It's  like  a  man  that's  let  every- 
thing slide  all  his  life  to  get  set  on  something  that  will 
make  the  most  trouble  for  everybody  he  knows." 

"Well,  it'll  take  the  Lord  to  get  her  over  that  river 
aow,"  Peabody  says.  "Anse  can't  do  it." 

"And  I  reckon  He  will/'  Quick  says.  "He's  took  care  of 
Anse  a  long  time,  now." 

"It's  a  fact,"  Littlejohn  says. 

Too  long  to  quit  now,"  Armstid  says. 

"I  reckon  He's  like  everybody  else  around  here,"  Uncle 
Billy  says.  "He's  done  it  so  long  now  He  can't  quit" 

Cash  comes  out.  He  has  put  on  a  clean  shirt;  his  hair, 
wet,  Is  combed  smooth  down  on  his  brow,  smooth  and 
black  as  if  he  had  painted  it  on  to  his  head.  He  squats 
stiffly  among  us,  we  watching  him. 

"You  feeling  this  weather,  ain't  you?"  Armstid  says. 

Cash  says  nothing. 

"A  broke  bone  always  feels  it,"  Littlejohn  says.  "A  fel- 
low with  a  broke  bone  can  tell  it  a-coming." 

"Lucky  Cash  got  off  with  just  a  broke  leg,"  Armstid 
says.  "He  might  have  hurt  himself  bedrid.  How  far'd  you 
fall,  Cash?" 

Twenty-eight  foot,  four  and  a  half  inches,  about/* 
Cash  says.  I  move  over  beside  him. 

"A  fellow  can  sho  slip  quick  on  wet  planks,"  Quick  says. 

"It's  too  bad,"  I  say.  "But  you  couldn't  a  help  it." 

"It's  them  durn  women,"  he  says.  "I  made  it  to  balance 
with  her.  I  made  it  to  her  measure  and  weight." 


AS     I     LAY     DYIdttG  4°3 

If  it  takes  wet  boards  for  folks  to  fall,  ifs  -fixing  to  "be 
lots  of  falling  before  this  spell  is  done. 

"You  couldn't  have  holp  it,"  I  say. 

I  dont  mind  the  folks  falling.  Ifs  the  cotton  and  corn  1 
mind. 

Neither  does  Peabody  mind  the  folks  falling.  How 
'bout  it,  Doc? 

It's  a  fact.  Washed  clean  outen  the  ground  it  will  be. 
Seems  like  something  is  always  happening  to  it. 

'Course  it  does.  That's  why  it's  worth  anything.  If  noth- 
ing didnt  happen  and  everybody  made  a  big  crop.,  do 
you  reckon  it  would  be  worth  the  raising? 

Well,  I  be  durn  if  I  like  to  see  my  work  washed  omen 
the  ground,  work  I  sweat  over. 

It's  a  fact.  A  fettow  wouldn't  mind  seeing  it  washed 
up  if  he  could  just  turn  on  the  rain  himself. 

Who  is  that  man  can  do  that?  Where  is  the  colour  of 
his  eyes? 

Ay.  The  Lord  made  it  to  grow.  Ifs  Hisn  to  wash  up 
if  He  sees  it  fitten  so. 

"You  couldn't  have  holp  it,"  I  say. 

"If  s  them  durn  women/'  he  says, 

In  the  house  the  women  begin  to  sing.  We  hear  the 
first  line  commence,  beginning  to  swell  as  they  take  hold, 
and  we  rise  and  move  toward  the  door,  taking  off  our 
hats  and  throwing  our  chews  away.  We  do  not  go  in.  We 
stop  at  the  steps,  clumped,  holding  our  hats  between  our 
lax  hands  in  front  or  behind,  standing  with  one  foot  ad- 
vanced and  our  heads  lowered,  looking  aside,  down  at 
our  hats  in  our  hands  and  at  the  earth  or  now  and  then 
at  the  sky  and  at  one  another's  grave,  composed  face. 

The  song  ends;  the  voices  quaver  away  with  a  rich  anc| 
dying  fall.  Whitfield  begins.  His  voice  is  bigger  than  him. 


It's  like  they  are  not  the  same.  It's  like  lie  is  one,  and  his 
voice  is  one,  swimming  on  two  horses  side  by  side  across 
the  ford  and  coming  into  the  house,  the  mud-splashed 
one  and  the  one  that  never  even  got  wet,  triumphant  and 
sad.  Somebody  in  the  house  begins  to  cry.  It  sounds  like 
her  eyes  and  her  voice  were  turned  back  inside  her,  lis- 
tening; we  move,  shifting  to  the  other  leg,  meeting  one 
another's  eye  and  makiag  like  they  hadn't  touched. 

Whitfield  stops  at  last.  The  women  sing  again.  In  the 
thick  air  it's  like  their  voices  come  out  of  the  airy  flowing 
together  and  on  in  the  sad,  comforting  tunes.  When  they 
.cease  it's  like  they  hadn't  gone  away.  It's  like  they  had 
just  disappeared  into  the  air  and  when  we  moved  we 
would  loose  them  again  out  of  the  air  around  us,  sad  and 
comforting.  Then  they  finish  and  we  put  on  our  hats,  our 
movements  stiff,  like  we  hadn't  never  wore  hats  before. 

On  the  way  home  Cora  is  still  singing.  "I  am  bounding 
toward  my  God  and  my  reward,"  she  sings,  sitting  on  the 
wagon,  the  shawl  around  her  shoulders  and  the  umbrella 
open  over  her,  though  it  is  not  raining. 

"She  has  hern,"  I  say.  "Wherever  she  went,  she  has  her 
reward  in  being  free  of  Anse  Bundren."  She  laid  there 
three  days  in  that  box,  waiting  for  Darl  and  Jewel  to 
come  clean  back  home  and  get  a  new  wheel  and  go  back 
to  where  the  wagon  was  in  the  ditch.  Take  my  team, 
Anse,  I  said. 

Well  wait  for  own,  he  said.  She'll  want  it  so.  She  was 
ever  a  particular  woman. 

On  the  third  day  they  got  back  and  they  loaded  her 
into  the  wagon  and  started  and  it  already  too  late.  You'll 
have  to  go  all  the  way  round  by  Samsons  bridge.  It'll 
take  you  a  day  to  get  there.  Then  you'll  be  forty  miles 
from  Jefferson.  Take  my  team,  Anse. 

We'll  wait  for  ourn.  She'll  want  it  so. 


AS     I     LAY     DYING  40  J 

It  was  about  a  mile  from  the  house  we  saw  him,  sitting 
on  the  edge  of  the  slough.  It  hadn't  had  a  fish  in  It  never 
that  I  knowed.  He  looked  around  at  us,  his  eyes  round 
and  calm,  Ms  face  dirty,  the  pole  across  his  knees.  Cora 
was  still  singing. 

"This  ain't  no  good  day  to  fish,"  I  said.  '"You  come  on 
home  with  us  and  me  and  you'll  go  down  to  the  river  first 
thing  in  the  morning  and  catch  some  fish." 

"It's  one  In  here/'  he  said.  "Dewey  Dell  seen  It" 
''You  come  on  with  us.  The  river's  the  best  place/* 
"It's  in  here/'  he  said.  "Dewey  Dell  seen  it" 
"I'm  bounding  toward  my  God  and  my  reward/'  Cora 
sung. 


DARL 


"  Ws  NOT  YOUR  HORSE  THAT?S  DEAD,  JEWEL/'  I  SAY.  HE  SITS 

A  erect  on  the  seat,  leaning  a  little  forward,  wooden- 
backed.  The  brim  of  his  hat  has  soaked  free  of  the  crown 
In  two  places,  drooping  across  his  wooden  face  so  that, 
head  lowered,  he  looks  through  it  like  through  the  visor 
of  a  helmet,  looking  long  across  the  valley  to  where  the 
barn  leans  against  the  bluff,  shaping  the  invisible  horse, 
"See  then?"  I  say.  High  above  the  house,  against  the 
quick  thick  sky,  they  hang  in  narrowing  circles.  From 
here  they  are  no  more  than  specks,  implacable,  patient 
portentous.  "But  it's  not  your  horse  that's  dead." 

"Goddamn  you,"  he  says.  "Goddamn  you/' 


406  AS     I     LAY     DYING 

I  cannot  love  my  mother  because  I  have  no  mother. 
Jewel's  mother  is  a  horse. 

Motionless,  the  taU  buzzards  hang  in  soaring  circles, 
the  clouds  giving  them  an  illusion  of  retrograde. 

Motionless,  wooden-backed,  wooden-faced,  he  shapes 
the  horse  in  a  rigid  stoop  like  a  hawk,  hook-winged. 
They  are  waiting  for  us,  ready  for  the  moving  of  it,  wait- 
ing for  him.  He  enters  the  stall  and  waits  until  it  kicks  at 
him  so  that  he  can  slip  past  and  mount  on  to  the  trough 
and  pause,  peering  out  across  the  intervening  stall-tops 
toward  the  empty  path,  before  he  reaches  into  the  loft. 

"Goddamn  Mm.  Goddamn  him." 


CASH 


IT  WON'T  BALAJSTQE.  IF  YOU  WANT  TO  TOTE  AND  RIDE  ON 
a  balance,  we  will  have " 

"Tick  up.  Goddamn  you,  pick  up." 
'Tm  telling  you  it  won't  tote  and  it  won't  ride  on  a  bal- 
ance unless " 

TPick  up!  Pick  up,  goddamn  your  thick-nosed  soul  to 
fiell,  pick  up!" 

It  won't  balance.  If  they  want  it  to  tote  and  ride  on  a 
balance,  they  will  have 


DARlb 


HE  STOOPS  AMONG  US  ABOVE  IT,  TWO  OF  THE  EIGHT 
hands.  In  Ms  face  the  blood  goes  in  waves.  In  be' 
tween  them  his  flesh  is  greenish  looking,  about  thai 
smooth,  thick,  pale  green  of  cow's  cud;  his  face  suffo' 
cated,  furious,  his  lip  lifted  upon  his  teeth.  Tick  up!"  he 
says.  "Pick  up,  goddamn  your  thick-nosed  soul!" 

He  heaves,  lifting  one  whole  side  so  suddenly  that  we 
all  spring  into  the  lift  to  catch  and  balance  it  before  he 
hurls  it  completely  over.  For  an  instant  it  resists,  as 
though  volitional,  as  though  within  it  her  pole-thin  body 
clings  furiously,  even  though  dead,  to  a  sort  of  modesty, 
as  she  would  have  tried  to  conceal  a  soiled  garment  that 
she  could  not  prevent  her  body  soiling.  Then  it  break? 
free,  rising  suddenly  as  though  the  emaciation  of  her 
body  had  added  buoyancy  to  the  planks  or  as  though, 
seeing  that  the  garment  was  about  to  be  torn  from  her, 
she  rushes  suddenly  after  it  in  a  passionate  reversal  that 
flouts  its  own  desire  and  need.  Jewel's  face  goes  com- 
pletely green  and  I  can  hear  teeth  in  his  breath. 

We  carry  it  down  the  hall,  our  feet  harsh  and  clumsy 
on  the  floor,  moving  with  shuffling  steps,  and  through  tho 
door. 

"Steady  it  a  minute,  now/'  pa  says,  letting  to.  He  turns 
back  to  shut  and  lock  the  door,  but  Jewel  will  no,  wait 

"Come  on/'  he  says  in  that  suffocating  voice.  "Come 

on." 

We  lower  it  carefully  down  the  steps.  We  move,  bal- 
ancing it  as  though  it  were  something  infinitely  precious, 

407 


408  AS     I     LAY     DYING 

our  faces  averted,  breathing  through  our  teeth  to  keep 
our  nostrils  closed.  We  go  down  the  path,  toward  the 
slope. 

"We  better  wait/'  Cask  says.  *I  tell  you  it  ain't  balanced 
now.  Well  need  another  hand  on  that  hill." 

"Then  turn  loose/*  Jewel  says.  He  will  not  stop.  Cash 
begins  to  faU  behind,  hobbling  to  keep  up,  breathing 
harshly;  then  he  is  distanced  and  Jewel  carries  the  entire 
front  end  alone,  so  that,  tilting  as  the  path  begins  to 
slant,  it  begins  to  rush  away  from  me  and  slip  down  the 
air  like  a  sled  upon  invisible  snow,  smoothly  evacuating 
atmosphere  in  which  the  sense  of  it  is  still  shaped. 

"Wait,  Jewel/'  I  say.  But  he  will  not  wait.  He  is  almost 
running  now  and  Cash  is  left  behind.  It  seems  to  me  that 
the  end  which  I  now  carry  alone  has  no  weight,  as 
though  it  coasts  like  a  rushing  straw  upon  the  furious  tide 
of  Jewel's  despair.  I  am  not  even  touching  it,  when,  turn- 
ing, he  lets  it  overshoot  him,  swinging,  and  stops  it 
and  sloughs  it  into  the  wagon-bed  in  the  same  motion 
and  looks  back  at  me,  his  face  suffused  with  fury  and  de- 
spair. 

"Goddamn  you.  Goddamn  you/' 


VARDAMAN 


f  1C  7E  ARE  GOING  TO  TOWN.  DEWEY  BELL  SAYS  IT  WON*T 

V  V  be  sold  because  it  belongs  to  Santa  Glaus  and  he 

has  taken  it  back  with  him  until  next  Christmas.  Then  it 

be  behind  the  glass  again,  shining  with  waiting. 


AS     I     LAY     DV«g£TG 

Pa  and  Cash  are  coming  down  the  hill,  but  Jewel  is  go- 
ing to  the  barn.  "Jewel/*  pa  says.  Jewel  does  not  stop. 
**Where  are  you  going?"  pa  says.  But  Jewel  does  not  stop. 
'Ton  leave  that  horse  here,"  pa  says.  Jewel  stops  and 
iooks  at  pa.  Jewel's  eyes  look  like  marbles.  **You  leave 
that  horse  here/'  pa  says.  "We'll  all  go  in  the  wagon  with 
ma,  like  she  wanted." 

But  my  mother  is  a  fish.  Vernon  seen  it  He  was  there. 

"Jewel's  mother  is  a  horse,"  Darl  said. 

"Then  mine  can  be  a  fish,  can't  it,  Darl?"  I  said. 

Jewel  is  my  brother. 

"Then  mine  will  have  to  be  a  horse,  too,"  I  said. 

'Why?"  Darl  said.  "If  pa  is  your  pa,  why  does  your  ma 
have  to  be  a  horse  just  because  Jewel's  is?" 

"Why  does  it?"  I  said.  "Why  does  it,  Darl?" 

Darl  is  my  brother. 

"Then  what  is  your  ma,  Darl?"  I  said. 

'1  haven't  got  ere  one,"  Darl  said.  "Because  if  I  had 
one,  it  is  was.  And  if  it  is  was,  it  can't  be  is.  Can  it?" 

"No,"  I  said. 

"Then  I  am  not/'  Darl  said  "Am  IF 

"No,"  I  said. 

I  am.  Darl  is  my  brother. 

"But  you  are,  Darl/'  I  said. 

"I  know  it,"  Darl  said.  "That's  why  I  ain  not  is.  Are  is 
too  many  for  one  woman  to  foal." 

Cash  is  carrying  his  tool-box.  Pa  looks  at  him.  "Til  stop 
at  TulTs  on  the  way  back,"  Cash  says.  "Get  on  that  bam 
roof." 

"It  ain't  respectful,"  pa  says.  "It's  a  deliberate  flouting 
of  her  and  of  me." 

TDo  you  want  him  to  come  all  the  way  back  here  and 
eany  them  up  to  TuITs  afoot-?"  D#rl  says.  Fa  looks  at 


4*0  AS      I      LAY     DYING 

Darl,  Ms  mouth  chewing.  Pa  shaves  every  day  now  be* 
cause  my  mother  Is  a  Ish. 

"Tfr  ain't  right,"  pa  says. 

Dewey  Dell  has  the  package  in  her  hand.  She  has  the 
basket  with  our  dinner  too. 

•What's  that?"  pa  says. 

"Mrs.  TulFs  cakes/*  Dewey  Dell  says,  getting  into  the 
wagon.  *Tm  taking  them  to  town  for  her." 

"It  ain't  right/'  pa  says.  "It's  a  flouting  of  the  dead.* 

It'll  be  there.  It'll  be  there  come  Christmas,  she  says5 
shining  on  the  track.  She  says  he  won't  sell  it  to  no  town 
boys. 


DARL 


HE   GOES   ON   TOWARD   THE   BARN,    ENTERING    THE   LOT, 
wooden-backed. 

Dewey  Dell  carries  die  basket  on  one  arm,  in  the  other 
hand  something  wrapped  square  in  a  newspaper.  Her 
face  is  calm  and  sullen,  her  eyes  brooding  and  alert; 
within  them  I  can  see  Peabody's  back  like  two  round 
peas  in  two  thimbles:  perhaps  in  Peabody's  back  two  or 
those  worms  which  work  surreptitious  and  steady 
through  you  and  out  the  other  side  and  you  waking  sud- 
denly from  sleep  or  from  waking,  with  on  your  face  an 
expression  sudden,  intent,  and  concerned.  She  sets  the 
basket  into  the  wagon  and  climbs  in,  her  leg  coming  long 
trow  beneath  her  tightening  dress:  that  lever  whicS 


DYING 

moves  tike  world;  one  ot  that  caiiper  which  measures  th« 
length  and  breadth  of  life.  She  sits  on  the  seat  "beside  Var- 
daman  and  sets  the  parcel  on  her  lap. 

Then  he  enters  the  barn.  He  has  not  looked  back. 

"It  ain't  right,"  pa  says.  "It's  little  enough  for  him  to  do 
for  her.39 

"Go  on,"  Cash  says.  "Leave  him  stay  if  he  wants.  He'lj 
be  all  right  here.  Maybe  he'll  go  irp  to  'lull's  and  stay.9* 

"He'll  catch  us/*  I  say.  "He'll  cut  across  and  meet  us  a! 
TulTs  lane." 

"He  would  have  rid  that  horse,  too/'  pa  says,  "if  1 
hadn't  a  stopped  him.  A  durn  spotted  critter  wilder  thar 
a  cattymount.  A  deliberate  flouting  of  her  and  of  me.'' 

The  wagon  moves;  the  mules'  eirs  begin  to  bob.  Be- 
hind us,  above  the  house.,  motionless  in  tali  and  soaring 
circles,  they  diminish  and  disappear. 


ANSE 


I  TOLD  HIM  NOT  TO  BWNG  THAT  HORSE  OUT  OF  RESPEC1 
for  his  dead  ma,  because  it  wouldn't  look  right,  him 
prancing  along  on  a  durn  circus  animal  and  her  wanting 
iis  all  to  be  in  the  wagon  with  her  that  sprung  from  her 
flesh  and  blood,  but  we  hadn't  no  more  than  passed  Tull'i 
lane  when  Darl  begun  to  laugh.  Setting  back  there  on  the 
plank  seat  with  Cash,  with  his  dead  rna  lying  in  her  cof- 
fin at  his  feet,  laughing.  How  many  times  I  told  him  it's 
doing  such  things  as  that  that  makes  folks  talk  about 


AS    i    :LAY    DYIJ^G 

I  don't  know.  I  says  I  got  some  regard  for  what  folks  say 
about  my  flesh,  and  blood  even  if  you  haven't,  even  if  1 
have  raised  such  a  dum  passel  of  boys,  and  when  yon 
fixes  it  so  folks  can  say  such  about  you,  it's  a  reflection 
on  your  ma,  I  says,  not  me:  1  am  a  man  and  I  can  stand 
it;  it's  on  your  womenfolks,  your  ma  and  sister  that  you 
should  care  for,  and  I  turned  and  looked  back  at  him  set- 
ting there,  laughing. 

"I  don't  expect  you  to  have  no  respect  for  me,"  I  says* 
"But  with  your  own  ma  not  cold  in  her  coffin  yet." 

"Yonder/'  Cash  says,  jerking  his  head  toward  the  lane. 
The  horse  is  still  a  right  smart  piece  away,  coming  up  at 
a  good  pace,  but  I  don't  have  to  be  told  who  it  is.  I  just 
looked  back  at  Darl,  setting  there  laughing. 

"I  done  my  best,"  I  says.  "I  tried  to  do  as  she  woidd 
wish  it  The  Lord  will  pardon  me  and  excuse  the  con- 
duct of  them  He  senc  me/3  And  Darl  setting  on  the  plank 
neat  right  above  her  where  she  was  laying,  laughing, 


DARL 


HE  COMES  "OF  THE  LANE  FAST,  YET  WE  ARE  THREE  HUN« 
dred  yards  beyond  the  mouth  of  it  when  he  turns 
into  the  road,  the  mud  flying  beneath  the  flickering  drive 
of  the  hooves.  Then  he  slows  a  little,  light  and  erect  in 
the  saddle,  the  horse  mincing  through  the  mud. 
TuU.  is  in  his  lot.  He  looks  at  us,  lifts  his  hand.  We  go 


AS     I     LAY     DYING  413 

on,  the  wagon  creaking,  the  mud  whispering  on  the 
wheels.  Vernon  still  stands  there.  He  watches  Jewel  as  he 
passes,  the  horse  moving  with  a  light,  high-kneed  driving 
gait?  three  hundred  yards  back.  We  go  on,  with  a  motion 
so  soporific,  so  dreamlike  as  to  be  uninf  erant  of  progress, 
as  though  time  and  not  space  were  decreasing  between  us 
and  it. 

It  turns  off  at  right  angles,  the  wheel-marks  of  last  Sun- 
day healed  away  now:  a  smooth,  red  scoriation  curving 
away  into  the  pines-;  a  white  signboard  with  faded  letter- 
ing: New  Hope  Church.  3  mi.  It  wheels  up  like  a  motion- 
less hand  lifted  above  the  profound  desolation  of  the 
ocean;  beyond  it  the  red  road  lies  like  a  spoke  of  which 
Addie  Bundren  is  the  rim.  It  wheels  past,  empty,  un- 
scarred,  the  white  signboard  turns  away  its  fading  and 
tranquil  assertion.  Cash  looks  up  the  road  quietly,  his 
head  turning  as  we  pass  it  like  an  owl's  head,  his  face 
composed.  Pa  looks  straight  ahead,  humped.  Dewey  Del] 
looks  at  the  road  too,  then  she  looks  back  at  me,  her  eyes 
watchful  and  repudiant,  not  like  that  question  which  was 
in  those  of  Cash,  for  a  smouldering  while.  The  signboard 
passes;  the  unscarred  road  wheels  on.  Then  Dewey  Dell 
turns  her  head.  The  wagon  creaks  on. 

Cash  spits  over  the  wheel.  "In  a  couple  of  days  now 
it'll  be  smelling/*  he  says. 

"You  might  tell  Jewel  that,"  I  say. 

He  is  motionless  now,  sitting  the  horse  at  the  junction, 
upright,  watching  us,  no  less  still  than  the  signboard  that 
lifts  its  fading  capitulation  opposite  him. 

"It  ain't  balanced  right  for  no  long  ride,"  Cash  says. 

"Tell  him  that,  too,"  I  say.  The  wagon  creaks  on. 

A  mile  farther  along  he  passes  us,  the  horse,  arch- 
necked,  reined  back  to  a  swift  single-foot.  He  sits 
lightly,  poised,  upright,  wooden-faced  in  the  saddle,  the 


4*4  AS      I      LAY      DYING 

broken  hat  raked  at  a  swaggering  angle.  He  passes  us 
swiftly,  without  looking  at  us,  the  horse  driving,  its 
hooves  hissing  in  the  mud.  A  gout  of  mud,  back-flung, 
plops  on  to  the  box.  Cash  leans  forward  and  takes  a  tool 
from  his  box  and  removes  it  carefully.  When  the  road 
crosses  Whiteleaf,  the  willows  leaning  near  enough,  he 
breaks  off  a  branch  and  scours  at  the  stain  with  the  wet 
leaves. 


ANSE 


I/S  A  HAKD  CXXJNTOY  ON  MAN;  IT'S  HARD.  EIGHT  MILES  OF 
the  sweat  of  his  body  washed  up  outen  the  Lord's 
earth,  where  the  Lord  Himself  told  him  to  put  it.  No- 
where in  this  sinful  world  can  a  honest,  hard-working 
man  profit.  It  takes  them  that  runs  the  stores  in  the 
towns,  doing  no  sweating,  living  off  of  them  that  sweats. 
It  ain't  the  hard-working  man,  the  farmer.  Sometimes  I 
wonder  why  we  keep  at  it.  It's  because  there  is  a  reward 
for  us  above,  where  they  can't  take  their  motors  and 
such.  Every  man  will  be  equal  there  and  it  will  be  taken 
from  them  that  have  and  give  to  them  that  have  not  by 
the  Lord. 

But  it's  a  long  wait,  seems  like.  It's  bad  that  a  fellow 
must  earn  the  reward  of  his  right-doing  by  flouting  his- 
self  and  his  dead.  We  drove  all  the  rest  of  the  day  and 
got  to  Samson's  at  dust-dark  and  then  that  bridge  was 
gone,  too.  They  hadn't  never  seen  the  river  so  high,  and 


AS     I     LAY     BYI3STG  415 

it's  not  done  raining  yet.  There  was  old  men  that  hadn't 
never  seen  nor  heard  of  it  being  so  in  the  memory  of 
man.  I  am  chosen  of  the  Lord,  for  who  He  loveth,  so 
doeth  He  chastised^  But  I  be  dum  if  He  don't  take  some 
curious  ways  to  show  it,  seems  like. 

But  now  I  can  get  them  teeth.  That  will  be  a  comfort 
It  will 


SAMSON 


IT  WAS  JUST  BEFOKE  SUNDOWN.  WE  WERE  SITTING  ON  THE 
porch  when  the  wagon  came  up  the  road  with  the  five 
of  them  in  it  and  the  other  one  on  the  horse  behind.  One 
of  them  raised  his  hand,  but  they  was  going  on  past  the 
store  without  stopping. 

'Who's  that?"  MacCallum  says:  I  cant  think  of  Ms 
name:  Rafe's  twin;  that  one  it  was. 

"It's  Bundren,  from  down  beyond  New  Hope/*  Quick 
says.  "There's  one  of  them  Snopes  horses  Jewel's  riding.* 

"I  didn't  know  there  was  ere  a  one  of  them  horses  left," 
MacCallum  says.  "I  thought  you  folks  down  there  finally 
contrived  to  give  them  all  away." 

"Try  and  get  that  one,"  Quick  says.  The  wagon  wen* 
on. 

"I  bet  old  man  Lon  never  gave  it  to  him/'  I  says. 

"No/'  Quick  says.  "He  bought  it  from  pappy."  The 
wagon  went  on.  'They  must  not  a  heard  about  the 
bridge,"  he  says. 


AS     I     LAY     DYIKG 

"WhatVe  they  doing  up  here,  anyway?"  MacCallum 
says. 

"Taking  a  holiday  since  he  got  his  wife  buried,  I 
reckon/*  Quick  says.  "Heading  for  town,  I  reckon,  with 
TulTs  bridge  gone  too.  I  wonder  if  they  ain't  heard  about 
the  bridge." 

"They'll  have  to  fly,  then/'  I  says.  "I  don't  reckon  there's 
ere  a  bridge  between  here  and  Mouth  of  Ishatawa." 

They  had  something  in  the  wagon.  But  Quick  had  been 
to  the  funeral  three  days  ago  and  we  naturally  never 
thought  anything  about  it  except  that  they  were  heading 
away  from  home  mighty  late  and  that  they  hadn't  heard 
about  the  bridge.  <cYou  better  holler  at  them/'  MacCallum 
says.  Burn  it,  the  name  is  right  on  the  tip  of  my  tongue, 
So  Quick  hollered  and  they  stopped  and  he  went  to  the 
wagon  and  told  them. 

He  come  back  with  them.  'They're  going  to  Jefferson/* 
he  says.  "The  bridge  at  Tulfs  is  gone,  too."  Like  we  didn't 
know  it,  and  his  face  looked  funny,  around  the  nostrils, 
but  they  just  sat  there,  Bundren  and  the  girl  and  the 
chap  on  the  seat,  and  Cash  and  the  second  one,  the  one 
folks  talks  about,  on  a  plank  across  the  tail-gate,  and  the 
other  one  on  that  spotted  horse.  But  I  reckon  they  was 
used  to  it  by  then  because  when  I  said  to  Cash  that 
they'd  have  to  pass  by  New  Hope  again  and  what  they'd 
better  do,  he  just  says., 

"I  reckon  we  can  get  there." 

I  ain't  much  for  meddling.  Let  every  man  run  his  own 
business  to  suit  himself,  I  say.  But  after  I  talked  to  Rachel 
about  them  not  having  a  regular  man  to  fix  her  and  it 
being  July  and  all,  I  went  back  down  to  the  barn  and 
tried  to  talk  to  Bundren  about  it. 

"I  give  her  my  promise,"  he  says.  "Her  mind  was  set  on 
it* 


AS     I     LAY     BYI3STG  417 

I  notice  how  it  takes  a  lazy  man,  a  man  that  hates  mov- 
ing, to  get  set  on  moving  once  he  does  get  started  off,  the 
same  as  he  was  set  on  staying  still,  like  it  ain't  the  moving 
he  hates  so  much  as  the  starting  and  stopping.  And  like 
he  would  be  kind  of  proud  of  whatever  come  up  to  make 
the  moving  or  the  setting  still  look  hard.  He  set  there  on 
the  wagon,  hunched  up,  blinking,  listening  to  us  tell 
about  how  quick  the  bridge  went  and  how  high  the 
water  was,  and  I  be  durn  if  he  didn't  act  like  h-^  was 
proud  of  it,  like  he  had  made  the  river  rise  himself. 

*Tou  say  it's  higher  than  you  ever  see  it  before?"  he 
says,  "God's  will  be  done,"  he  says.  "I  reckon  it  won't  go 
down  much  by  morning,  neither,"  he  says. 

"You  better  stay  here  tonight,"  I  says,  "and  get  a  early 
start  for  New  Hope  tomorrow  morning.'"  I  was  just  sorry 
for  them  bone-gaunted  mules.  I  told  Rachel,  I  says,  'Well, 
would  you  have  had  me  turn  them  away  at  dark,  eight 
miles  from  home?  What  else  could  I  do,"  I  says.  "It  won't 
be  but  one  night,  and  they'll  keep  it  in  the  barn,  and 
they'll  sholy  get  started  by  daylight."  And  so  I  says,  *Tou 
stay  here  t©night  and  early  tomorrow  you  can  go  back  to 
New  Hope.  I  got  tools  enough,  and  the  boys  can  go  on 
light  after  supper  and  have  it  dug  and  ready  if  they 
want,"  and  then  I  found  that  girl  watching  me.  If  her 
eyes  had  a  been  pistols,  I  wouldn't  be  talking  now.  I  be 
dog  if  they  didn't  blaze  at  me.  And  so  when  I  went  down 
to  the  barn  I  come  on  them,  her  talking  so  she  never  no- 
ticed when  I  come  up. 

"You  promised  her,"  she  says.  "She  wouldn't  go  until 
you  promised.  She  thought  she  could  depend  on  you.  If 
you  don't  do  it,  it  will  be  a  curse  on  you." 

"Can't  no  man  say  I  don't  aim  to  keep  my  word/'  Bun* 
dren  says.  "My  heart  is  open  to  ere  a  man." 

"I  don't  care  what  your  heart  is,"  she  says.  She  was 


4*8  AS     I     LAY     DYING 

whispering,  kind  of?  talking  fast.  "You  promised  iier. 

You've  got  to.  You "  Then  she  seen  me  and  quit, 

standing  there.  If  they'd  been  pistols,  I  wouldn't  be  talk- 
ing now,  So  when  I  talked  to  him  about  it,  he  says, 

"I  give  her  my  promise.  Her  mind  is  set  on  it.*9 

TBut  seems  to  me  she'd  rather  have  her  ma  buried  close 
by,  so  she  could " 

"It's  Addie  I  give  the  promise  to,**  he  says.  "Her  mind 
is  set  on  it" 

So  I  told  them  to  drive  it  into  the  barn  because  it  was 
"threatening  rain  again,  and  that  supper  was  about  ready. 
Only  they  didn't  want  to  come  in. 

"I  thank  you/'  Bundren  says.  "We  wouldn't  discom- 
mode you.  We  got  a  little  something  in  the  basket.  We 
can  make  out." 

'Well,"  I  says,  "since  you  are  so  particular  about  your 
womenfolks,  I  am  too.  And  when  folks  stops  with  us  at 
meal-time  and  won't  come  to  the  table,  my  wife  takes  it 
as  a  insult." 

So  the  girl  went  on  to  the  kitchen  to  help  Rachel.  And 
then  Jewel  come  to  me. 

"Sho,"  I  says.  "Help  yourself  outen  the  loft.  Feed  him 
when  you  bait  the  mules." 

"I  rather  pay  you  for  him/'  he  says. 

"What  for?"  I  says.  "I  wouldn't  begrudge  no  man  a 
bait  for  his  horse." 

*1  rather  pay  you,"  he  says;  I  thought  he  said  extra. 

"Extra  for  what?"  I  says.  'Won't  he  eat  hay  and  corn?" 

"Extra  feed,"  he  says.  "I  feed  him  a  little  extra  and  1 
don't  want  him  beholden  to  no  man." 

"You  can't  buy  no  feed  from  me,  boy,"  I  says.  "And  if 
he  can  eat  that  loft  clean,  111  help  you  load  the  barn  on 
to  the  wagon  in  the  morning.'* 


AS     I     LAY     DYI^G  415 

"He  ain't  never  been  beholden  to  no  man/*  lie  says.  *1 
rather  pay  yon  for  it." 

And  if  I  had  my  rathers,  you  wouldn't  be  here  a-taH,  1 
wanted  to  say.  But  I  just  says,  "Then  it's  high  time  "he 
commenced.  You  can't  buy  no  feed  from  me." 

When  Rachel  put  supper  on,  her  and  the  girl  went 
and  fixed  some  beds.  But  wouldn't  any  of  them  come  in. 
"She's  been  dead  long  enough  to  get  over  that  sort  of 
foolishness,"  I  says.  Because  I  got  just  as  much  respect 
for  the  dead  as  ere  a  man,  but  you've  got  to  respect  the 
dead  themselves,  and.  a  woman  that's  been  dead  in  a  box 
four  days,  the  best  way  to  respect  her  is  to  get  her  into 
the  ground  as  quick  as  you  can.  But  they  wouldn't  do  it 

"It  wouldn't  be  right,"  Bundren  says.  "Course,  if  the 
boys  wants  to  go  to  bed,  I  reckon  I  can  set  up  with  her. 
I  don't  begrudge  her  it." 

So  when  I  went  back  down  there  they  were  squatting 
on  the  ground  around  the  wagon,  all  of  them.  "Let  that 
chap  come  to  the  house  and  get  some  sleep,  anyway,"  I 
says.  "And  you  better  come  too,"  I  says  to  the  girl.  I 
wasn't  aiming  to  interfere  with  them.  And  I  sholy  hadn't 
done  nothing  to  her  that  I  knowed. 

"He's  done  already  asleep,"  Bundren  says.  They  had 
done  put  him  to  bed  in  the  trough  in  a  empty  stall. 

"Well,  you  come  on,  then,"  I  says  to  her.  But  still  she 
never  said  nothing.  They  just  squatted  there.  You 
couldn't  hardly  see  them.  "How  about  you  boys?"  I 
says.  "You  got  a  full  day  tomorrow."  After  a  while  Cash 
says, 

"I  thank  you.  We  can  make  out." 

"We  wouldn't  be  beholden,"  Bundren  says.  "I  thank 
you  kindly." 

So  I  left  them  squatting  there.  I  reckon  after  four  days 
they  was  used  to  it.  But  Rachel  wasn't. 


AS     I     LAY     DYING 

"It's  an  outrage/'  she  says.  "An  outrage." 

"What  could  he  V  done?"  I  says.  "He  give  her  his  prom- 
ised word." 

'Who's  talking  about  him?5>  she  says.  "Who  cares  about 
him?"  she  says,  crying.  "I  just  wish  that  you  and  him  and 
all  the  men  in  the  world  that  torture  us  alive  and  flout  us 
dead,  dragging  us  up  and  down  the  country ** 

"Now,  now,"  I  says.  "You're  upset." 

TDon't  you  touch  me!"  she  says.  "Don*t  you  touch  meP 

A  man  can't  tell  nothing  about  them.  I  lived  with  the 
same  one  fifteen  years  and  I  be  durn  if  I  can.  And  I 
Imagined  a  lot  of  things  coming  up  between  us,  but  I  be 
durn  if  I  ever  thought  it  would  be  a  body  four  days  dead 
and  that  a  woman.  But  they  make  life  hard  on  them  not 
taking  it  as  it  comes  up,  like  a  man  does. 

So  I  laid  there,  hearing  it  commence  to  rain,  thinking 
about  them  down  there,  squatting  around  the  wagon 
and  the  rain  on  the  roof,  and  thinking  about  Rachel  cry- 
ing there  until  after  a  while  it  was  like  I  could  still  hear 
her  crying  even  after  she  was  asleep,  and  smelling  it  even 
when  I  knowed  I  couldn't.  I  couldn't  decide  even  thei? 
whether  I  could  or  not?  or  if  it  wasn't  just  knowing  it  was 
what  it  was. 

So  next  morning  I  never  went  down  there.  I  heard 
them  hitching  up  and  then  when  I  knowed  they  must  be 
about  ready  to  take  out,  I  went  out  the  front  and  went 
down  the  road  toward  the  bridge  until  I  heard  the  wagon 
come  out  of  the  lot  and  go  back  toward  New  Hope.  And 
then  when  I  come  back  to  the  house,  Rachel  jumped  on 
me  because  I  wasn't  there  to  make  them  come  in  to 
breakfast  You  can't  tell  about  them.  Just  about  when  you 
decide  they  mean  one  thing,  I  be  durn  if  you  not  only 
haven't  got  to  change  your  mind,  like  as  not  you  got  to 
take  a  raw-hiding  for  thinking  they  meant  it. 


AS    i    :LAY    DYING  421 

But  It  was  still  like  I  could  smell  it.  And  so  I  decided 
then  that  it  wasn't  smelling  it,  but  it  was  just  knowing  it 
was  there,  like  you  will  get  fooled  now  and  then.  But 
when  i  went  to  the  barn  I  knew  different.  When  I  walked 
into  the  hallway  I  saw  something.  It  kind  of  hunkered 
up  when  I  come  in  and  I  thought  at  first  it  was  one  of 
them  got  left,  then  I  saw  what  it  was.  It  was  a  buzzard. 
It  looked  around  and  saw  me  and  went  on  down  the  hall, 
spraddle-legged,  with  its  wings  kind  of  hunkered  out, 
watching  me  first  over  one  shoulder  and  then  over  the 
other,  like  a  old  bald-headed  man.  When  it  got  outdoors 
it  begun  to  fly.  It  had  to  fly  a  long  time  before  it  ever  got 
up  into  the  air,  with  it  thick  and  heavy  and  full  of  rain 
like  it  was. 

If  they  was  bent  on  going  to  Jefferson,  I  reckon  they 
could  have  gone  around  up  by  Mount  Vernon,  like  Mac- 
Callum  did.  Hell  get  home  about  day  after  tomorrow, 
horse-back.  Then  they'd  be  just  eighteen  miles  from 
town.  But  maybe  this  bridge  being  gone  too  has  learned 
him  the  Lord's  sense  and  judgment. 

That  MacCallum.  He's  been  trading  with  me  off  and 
on  for  twelve  years.  I  have  known  him  from  a  boy  up; 
know  his  name  as  well  as  I  do  my  own.  But  be  durn  if 
I  can  say  it. 


DEWEY    DELL 


THE  SIGNBOABD  COMES  IN  SIGHT.  IT  IS  LOOKING  OUT  AT 
the  road  now,  because  it  can  wait  New  Hope.  3  mi. 
it  will  say.  New  Hope.  3  mi.  New  Hope.  3  mi.  And  then 
the  road  will  begin,  curving  away  into  the  trees,  empty 
with  waiting,  saying  New  Hope  three  miles. 

I  heard  that  my  mother  is  dead.  I  wish  I  had  time  to 
let  her  die.  I  wish  I  had  time  to  wish  I  had.  It  is  because 
in  the  wild  and  outraged  earth  too  soon  too  soon  too 
soon.  It's  not  that  I  wouldn't  and  will  not  it's  that  it  is 
too  soon  too  soon  too  soon. 

Now  it  begins  to  say  it  New  Hope  three  miles.  New 
Hope  three  miles.  That's  what  they  mean  by  the  womb 
of  time:  the  agony  and  the  despair  of  spreading  bones, 
the  hard  girdle  in  which  lie  the  outraged  entrails  of 
events.  Cash's  head  turns  slowly  as  we  approach,  his  pale, 
empty,  sad,  composed  and  questioning  face  following 
the  red  and  empty  curve;  beside  the  back  wheel  Jewel 
sits  the  horse,  gazing  straight  ahead. 

The  land  runs  out  of  Darl's  eyes;  they  swim  to  pin- 
points. They  begin  at  my  feet  and  rise  along  my  body  to 
my  face,  and  then  my  dress  is  gone:  I  sit  naked  on  the 
seat  above  the  unhurrying  mules,  above  the  travail.  Sup- 
pose I  tell  him  to  turn.  He  will  do  what  I  say.  Don't  you 
know  he  will  do  what  I  say?  Once  I  waked  with  a  black 
void  rushing  under  me.  I  could  not  see.  I  saw  Vardaman 
rise  and  go  to  the  window  and  strike  the  knife  into  the 
fish,  the  blood  gushing,  hissing  like  steam  but  I  could  not 

422 


AS     1     LAY     DYING 

see.  Hell  do  as  I  say.  He  always  does.  I  can  persuade 
him  to  anything.  You  know  1  can.  Suppose  I  say  Turn 
here.  That  was  when  I  died  that  time.  Suppose  I  do. 
We'll  go  to  New  Hope.  We  wont  have  to  go  to  town* 
I  rose  and  took  the  knife  from  the  streaming  fish  still 
hissing  and  I  killed  Darl. 

When  I  used  to  sleep  with  Vardaman  I  had  a  night~ 
mare  once  I  thought  I  was  awake  but  I  couldn't  see  and 
couldnt  feel  the  bed  under  me  and  I  couldnt  think 
what  I  was  I  couldnt  think  of  my  name  I  couldn't  even 
think  I  am  a  girl  I  couldn't  even  think  I  nor  even  think  I 
want  to  wake  up  nor  remember  what  was  opposite  to 
awake  so  I  could  do  that  I  knew  that  something  toas  pass~ 
ing  but  I  couldnt  even  think  of  time  then  all  of  a  sudden 
I  knew  that  something  was  it  was  ivind  blowing  over  me 
it  was  like  the  wind  came  and  blew  me  back  from  where 
it  was  I  was  not  blowing  the  room  and  Vardaman  asleep 
and  all  of  them  back  under  me  again  and  going  on  like  a 
piece  of  cool  silk  dragging  across  my  naked  legs. 

It  blows  cool  out  of  the  pines,  a  sad  steady  jound.  New 
Hope.  Was  3  mi.  Was  3  mi.  I  believe  in  God  I  believe  in 
God. 

'Why  didn't  we  go  to  New  Hope,  pa?"  Vardaman  says. 
"Mr.  Samson  said  we  was,  but  we  done  passed  the  road.31 

Darl  says,  "Look,  Jewel."  But  he  is  not  looking  at  me. 
He  is  looking  at  the  sky.  The  buzzard  is  as  still  as  if  lie 
were  nailed  to  it. 

We  turn  into  lull's  lane.  We  pass  the  barn  and  go  on, 
the  wheels  whispering  in  the  mud,  passing  the  green 
rows  of  cotton  in  the  wild  earth,  and  Vernon  little  across 
the  field  behind  the  plough.  He  lifts  his  hand  as  we  pas? 
and  stands  there  looking  after  us  for  a  long  while. 

"Look,  Jewel,"  Darl  says.  Jewel  sits  on  his  horse  like 


AS     I     LAY     DYING 


they  were  both  made  out  of  wood,   looking  straight 
ahead, 
I  believe  in  God,  God.  God,  I  believe  in  God. 


TULL 


AFTER  THEY  PASSED  I  TAKEN  THE  MULE  OUT  AND  LOOPED 
up  the  trace  chains  and  followed.  They  were  setting 
in  the  wagon  at  the  end  of  the  levee.  Anse  was  setting 
there,  looking  at  the  bridge  where  it  was  swagged  down 
into  the  river  with  just  the  two  ends  in  sight.  He  was 
looking  at  it  like  he  had  believed  all  the  time  that  folks 
had  been  lying  to  him  about  it  being  gone,  but  like  he 
was  hoping  aU  the  time  it  really  was.  Kind  of  pleased  as- 
tonishment he  looked,  setting  on  the  wagon  in  his  Sun- 
day pants,  mumbling  his  mouth.  Looking  like  a  uncur- 
ried  horse  dressed  up:  I  don't  know* 

The  boy  was  watching  the  bridge  where  it  was  mid- 
ifunk  and  logs  and  such  drifted  up  over  it  and  it  swag- 
ging  and  shivering  like  the  whole  thing  would  go  any 
ninute,  big-eyed  he  was  watching  it,  like  he  was  to  a  cir- 
sus.  And  the  gal,  too.  When  I  come  up  she  looked  around 
it  me,  her  eyes  kind  of  blaring  up  and  going  hard  like  I 
lad  made  to  touch  her.  Then  she  looked  at  Anse  again 
ind  then  back  at  the  water  again. 

It  was  nigh  up  to  the  levee  on  both  sides,  the  earth 
lid  except  for  the  tongue  of  it  we  was  on  going  out  to 
he  bridge  and  then  down  into  the  water,  and  except  for 


AS     I     LAY     DYING 

knowing  bow  the  road  and  the  bridge  used  to  look,  ft 
fellow  couldn't  tell  where  was  the  river  and  where  tibtf 
land.  It  was  just  a  tangle  of  yellow  and  the  levee  not  less 
wider  than  a  knife-back  land  of,  with  us  setting  in  the 
wagon  and  on  the  horse  and  the  mule. 

Darl  was  looking  at  me,  and  then  Cash  turned  and 
looked  at  me  with  that  look  In  his  eyes  like  when  he  was 
figuring  on  whether  the  planks  would  fit  her  that  night, 
like  he  was  measuring  them  inside  of  him  and  not  asking 
you  to  say  what  you  thought  and  not  even  letting  on  he 
was  listening  if  you  did  say  it,  but  listening  all  right 
Jewel  hadn't  moved.  He  sat  there  on  the  horse,  leaning  a 
little  forward,  with  that  same  look  on  his  face  when  hfari 
and  Darl  passed  the  house  yesterday,  coming  back  to  get 
her. 

"If  it  was  just  up,  we  could  drive  across,"  Anse  says. 
4*We  could  drive  right  on  across  it." 

Sometimes  a  log  would  get  shoved  over  the  jam  and 
float  on,  rolling  and  turning,  and  wo  could  watch  it  go  on 
to  where  the  ford  used  to  be.  It  would  slow  up  and  whirl 
crossways  and  hang  out  of  water  for  a  minute,  and  you 
could  tell  by  that  that  the  ford  used  to  be  there. 

"But  that  don't  show  nothing,"  I  say.  "It  could  be  a  bar 
of  quicksand  built  up  there."  We  watch  the  log.  Then  the 
gal  is  looking  at  me  again. 

"Mr.  Whitfield  crossed  it,"  she  says. 

"He  was  a  horse-back,"  I  say.  "And  three  days  ago.  It's 
riz  five  foot  since." 

"If  the  bridge  was  just  up/*  Anse  says. 

The  log  bobs  up  and  goes  on  again.  There  is  a  lot  of 
trash  and  foam,  and  you  can  hear  the  water. 

"But  it's  down,"  Anse  says. 

Cash  says,  "A  careful  fellow  could  walk  across  yondei 
on  the  planks  and  logs." 


A§     I     1LAY     BYIISTG 

"But  you  couldn't  tote  nothing,"  I  say.  "Likely  time 
you  set  foot  on  that  mess,  it'll  all  go,  too.  What  you  think, 
Darl?" 

He  is  looking  at  me.  He  don't  say  nothing;  just  looks  at 
me  with  them  queer  eyes  of  hisn  that  makes  folks  talk, 
I  always  say  it  ain't  never  been  what  he  done  so  much 
or  said  or  anything  so  much  as  how  he  looks  at  you.  It's 
like  he  had  got  into  the  inside  of  you,  someway.  Like 
somehow  you  was  looking  at  yourself  and  your  doings 
outen  his  eyes.  Then  I  can  feel  that  gal  watching  me  like 
i  had  made  to  touch  her.  She  says  something  to  Anse, 
*.  .  .  Mr.  Whitfield  .  .  ."  she  says. 

"I  give  her  my  promised  word  in  the  presence  of  the 
Lord,37  Anse  says.  "I  reckon  it  ain't  no  need  to  worry.** 

But  still  he  does  not  start  the  mules.  We  set  there 
above  the  water.  Another  log  bobs  up  over  the  jam  and 
goes  on;  we  watch  it  check  up  and  swing  slow  for  a  min- 
ute where  the  ford  used  to  be.  Then  it  goes  on. 

"It  might  start  falling  tonight,"  I  say.  "You  could  lay 
over  one  more  day." 

Then  Jewel  turns  sideways  on  the  horse.  He  has  not 
moved  until  then,  and  he  turns  and  looks  at  me.  His 
face  is  kind  of  green,  then  it  would  go  red  and  then  green 
again.  "Get  to  hell  on  back  to  your  damn  ploughing,"  he 
says.  "Who  the  hell  asked  you  to  follow  us  here?" 

"I  never  meant  no  harm,"  I  say. 

"Shut  up,  Jewel,"  Cash  says.  Jewel  looks  back  at  the 
water,  his  face  gritted,  going  red  and  green  and  then  red. 
'Well,"  Cash  says  after  a  while,  "what  you  want  to  do?" 

Anse  don't  say  nothing.  He  sets  humped  up,  mumbling 
his  mouth.  "If  it  was  just  up,  we  could  drive  across  it/'  he 
says. 

"Come  on,"  Jewel  says,  moving  the  horse. 

"Wait/'  Cash  says.  He  looks  at  the  bridge.  We  look  at 


AS      I     -LAY      JDYUSTO-  4*7 

him,  except  Anse  and  the  gal.  They  are  looking  at  the 
water.  "Dewey  Dell  and  Vardaman  and  pa  better  walk 
across  on  the  bridge,"  Cash  says. 

"Vernon  can  help  them/'  Jewel  says.  "And  we  can  hitch 
his  mule  ahead  of  ourn." 

"Y ou  ain't  going  to  take  my  mule  into  that  water,**  I  say. 

Jewel  looks  at  me.  His  eyes  look  like  pieces  of  a  broken 
plate.  "Ill  pay  for  your  damn  mule.  Ill  buy  it  from  you 
right  now." 

"My  mule  ain't  going  into  that  water,"  I  say. 

"Jewel's  going  to  use  his  horse,"  Darl  says.  'Why  won't 
you  risk  your  mule,  Vernon?" 

"Shut  up,  Darl,"  Cash  says.  "You  and  Jewel  both." 

"My  mule  ain't  going  into  that  water,"  I  say. 


DARL 


HE  SITS  THE  HORSE,  GLABING  AT  VEBNON,  HIS  LEAN  FACE 
suffused  up  to  and  beyond  the  pale  rigidity  of  his 
eyes.  The  summer  when  he  was  fifteen,  he  took  a  spell  of 
sleeping.  One  morning  when  I  went  to  feed  the  mules  the 
cows  were  stil]  in  the  tie-up  and  then  I  heard  pa  go  back 
to  the  house  and  call  him.  When  we  came  on  back  to  the 
house  for  breakfast  he  passed  us,  carrying  the  milk  buck* 
ets,  stumbling  along  like  he  was  drunk,  and  he  was  milk- 
ing when  we  put  the  mules  in  and  went  on  to  the  field 
without  him.  We  had  been  there  an  hour  and  still  he 
never  showed  up.  When  Dewey  Dell  came  with  our 


<28  AS     I     LAY     DYING 

lunch,  pa  sent  her  back  to  find  Jewel  They  found  him  in. 
the  tie-up,  sitting  on  the  stool,  asleep. 

After  that,  every  morning  pa  would  go  in  and  wake 
;liim.  He  would  go  to  sleep  at  the  supper-table  and  soon 
as  supper  was  finished  he  would  go  to  bed,  and  when  I 
came  in  to  bed  he  would  be  lying  there  like  a  dead  man. 
Yet  still  pa  would  have  to  wake  him  in  the  morning.  He 
would  get  up,  but  he  wouldn't  hardly  have  half  sense: 
he  would  stand  for  pa's  jawing  and  complaining  without 
a  word  and  take  the  milk  buckets  and  go  to  the  barn, 
and  once  I  found  him  asleep  at  the  cow,  the  bucket  in 
place  and  half-full  and  his  hands  up  to  the  wrists  in  the 
milk  and  his  head  against  the  cow's  flank. 

After  that  Dewey  Dell  had  to  do  the  milking.  He  still 
got  up  when  pa  waked  him,  going  about  what  we  told 
him  to  do  in  that  dazed  way.  It  was  like  he  was  trying 
hard  to  do  them;  that  he  was  as  puzzled  as  anyone  else. 

"Are  you  sick?"  ma  said.  "Don't  you  feel  all  right?'" 

"Yes,"  Jewel  said.  "I  feel  all  right" 

"He's  just  lazy,  trying  me,"  pa  said,  and  Jewel  standing 
there,  asleep  on  his  feet  like  as  not.  "Ain't  you?"  he  said,, 
waking  Jewel  up  again  to  answer. 

"No,"  Jewel  said, 

''You  take  off  and  stay  in  the  house  today,"  ma  said. 

'With  that  whole  bottom  piece  to  be  busted  out?"  pa 
said.  "If  you  ain't  sick,  what's  the  matter  with  you?" 

"Nothing/'  Jewel  said.  Tm  all  right." 

"All  right?"  pa  said.  "You're  asleep  on  your  feet  this 
minute." 

"No,"  Jewel  said.  Tm  all  right" 

"I  want  him  to  stay  at  home  today,"  ma  said. 

"I'll  need  him,"  pa  said.  "It's  tight  enough,  with  all  of 
us  to  do  it" 


AS     I     LAY     DYING 

"YoiiTl  just  have  to  do  the  best  you  can  with  Cash  and 
Darf,"  ma  said.  "I  want  him  to  stay  in  today/' 

But  he  wouldn't  do  it.  "I'm  all  right,"  he  said,  going  on* 
But  he  wasn't  all  right.  Anybody  could  see  it  He  was  los- 
ing flesh,  and  I  have  seen  him  go  to  sleep  chopping^ 
watched  the  hoe  going  slower  and  slower  up  and  down, 
with  less  and  less  of  an  arc,  until  it  stopped  and  he  lean- 
ing on  it  motionless  in  the  hot  shimmer  of  the  sun. 

Ma  wanted  to  get  the  doctor,  but  pa  didn't  want  to 
spend  the  money  without  it  was  needful,  and  Jewel 
did  seem  all  right  except  for  his  thinness  and  his  way  of 
dropping  off  to  sleep  at  any  moment.  He  ate  hearty 
enough,  except  for  his  way  of  going  to  sleep  in  his  plate, 
with  a  piece  of  bread  half-way  to  his  mouth  and  his  jaws 
still  chewing.  But  he  swore  he  was  all  right. 

It  was  ma  that  got  Dewey  Dell  to  do  his  milking,  paid 
her  somehow,  and  the  other  jobs  around  the  house  that 
Jewel  had  been  doing  before  supper  she  found  some  way 
for  Dewey  Dell  and  Vardaman  to  do  them.  And  doing 
them  herself  when  pa  wasn't  there.  She  would  fix  him 
special  things  to  eat  and  hide  them  for  him.  And  that 
may  have  been  when  I  first  found  it  out,  that  Addie 
Bundren  should  be  hiding  anything  she  did,  who  had 
tried  to  teach  us  that  deceit  was  such  that,  in  a  world 
where  it  was,  nothing  else  could  be  very  bad  or  very  im- 
portant, not  even  poverty.  And  at  times  when  I  went  in 
to  go  to  bed  she  would  be  sitting  in  the  dark  by  Jewel 
where  he  was  asleep.  And  I  knew  that  she  was  hating  her- 
self for  that  deceit  and  hating  Jewel  because  she  had  to 
love  him  so  that  she  had  to  act  the  deceit. 

One  night  she  was  taken  sick  and  when  I  went  to  the 
bam  to  put  the  team  in  and  drive  to  lull's,  I  couldn't 
find  the  lantern.  I  remembered  noticing  it  on  the  nail  the 


43°  AS     I     LAY     DYING 

night  before,  but  It  wasn't  there  now  at  midnight.  So  1 
hitched  in  the  dark  and  went  on  and  came  back  with 
Mrs.  Toll  just  after  daylight.  And  there  the  lantern  was, 
hanging  on  the  nail  where  I  remembered  it  and  couldn't 
find  it  before.  And  then  one  morning  while  Dewey  Dell 
was  milking  just  before  sun-up,  Jewel  came  into  the  barn 
from  the  back,  through  the  hole  in  the  back  wall,  with 
the  lantern  in  his  hand. 

I  told  Cash,  and  Cash  and  1  looked  at  one  another. 

Cutting,"  Cash  said. 

"Yes,"  I  said.  "But  why  the  lantern?  And  every  night, 
loo.  No  wonder  he's  losing  flesh.  Are  you  going  to  say 
anything  to  him?" 

"Won't  do  any  good/*  Cash  said. 

"What  he's  doing  now  won't  do  any  good,  either." 

**1  know.  But  hell  have  to  learn  that  himself.  Give  Mm 
time  to  realize  that  it'll  save,  that  there'll  be  just  as  much 
more  tomorrow,  and  he'll  be  all  right  I  wouldn't  tell  any- 
body, I  reckon." 

"No/'  I  said.  "I  told  Dewey  Dell  not  to.  Not  ma,  any* 
way." 

"No.  Not  ma." 

After  that  I  thought  it  was  right  comical:  he  acting  so 
bewildered  and  willing  and  dead  for  sleep  and  gaunt  as 
a  bean-pole,  and  thinking  he  was  so  smart  with  it.  And  I 
wondered  who  the  girl  was.  I  thought  of  all  I  knew  that 
it  might  be,  but  I  couldn't  say  for  sure. 

"'Taint  any  girl/'  Cash  said.  "It's  a  married  woman 
somewhere.  Ain't  any  young  girl  got  that  much  daring 
and  staying  power.  That's  what  I  don't  like  about  it." 

"Why?"  I  said.  "She'll  be  safer  for  him  than  a  girl 
Would.  More  judgment." 

He  looked  at  me,  his  eyes  fumbling,  the  words  fum- 


•XS     I     LAY     DYING  43* 

bling  at  what  he  was  trying  to  say.  "It  ain't  always  the 
safe  things  in  this  world  that  a  fellow  .  *  /' 

"You  mean,  the  safe  things  are  not  always  the  best 
things?" 

"Ay;  best/*  he  said,  fumbling  again.  It  ain't  the  best, 
things,  the  things  that  are  good  for  him.  ...  A  young 
boy.  A  fellow  land  of  hates  to  see  .  .  .  wallowing  in  some 
body  else's  mire  .  .  ."  That's  what  he  was  trying  to  say. 
When  something  is  new  and  hard  and  bright,  there 
ought  to  be  something  a  little  better  for  it  than  just  be- 
ing safe,  since  the  safe  things  are  just  the  things  that  folks' 
have  been  doing  so  long  they  have  worn  the  edges  off 
and  there's  nothing  to  the  doing  of  them  that  leaves  a 
man  to  say.  That  was  not  done  before  and  it  cannot  be 
done  again. 

So  we  didn't  tell,  not  even  when  after  a  while  he'd  ap- 
pear suddenly  in  the  field  beside  us  and  go  to  work,  with- 
out having  had  time  to  get  home  and  make  out  he  had 
been  in  bed  all  night.  He  would  tell  ma  that  he  hadn't 
been  hungry  at  breakfast  or  that  he  had  eaten  a  piece  of 
bread  while  lie  was  hitching  up  the  team.  But  Cash  and  1 
knew  that  he  hadn't  been  home  at  all  on  those  nights 
and  he  had  come  up  out  of  tho  woods  when  we  got  to 
the  field.  But  we  didn't  teU.  Summer  was  almost  over 
then;  we  knew  that  when  the  nights  began  to  get  cool, 
she  would  be  done  if  he  wasn't. 

But  when  fall  came  and  the  nights  began  to  get  longer, 
the  only  difference  was  that  he  would  always  be  in  bed 
for  pa  to  wake  him,  getting  him  up  at  last  in  that  first 
state  of  semi-idiocy  like  when  it  first  started,  worse  than 
when  he  had  stayed  out  all  night. 

"She's  sure  a  stayer/'  I  told  Cash.  "I  used  to  admire 
her,  but  I  downright  respect  her  now." 


43*  AS      I     LAY      DYING 

Tit  ain't  a  woman,"  he  said. 

"You  know/'  I  said.  But  lie  was  watching  me.  "What  is 
it  then?" 

"That's  what  I  aim  to  find  out,"  he  said. 

"Yon  can  trail  him  through  the  woods  all  night  if  you 
want  to,"  I  said.  *Tm  not." 

"I  ain't  trailing  him/*  he  said. 

"What  do  you  call  it,  then?" 

"I  ain't  trailing  him/'  he  said.  "I  don't  mean  it  that 
way." 

And  so  a  few  nights  later  I  heard  Jewel  get  up  and 
climb  out  the  window,  and  then  I  heard  Cash  get  up 
and  follow  him.  The  next  morning  when  I  went  to  the 
barn,  Cash  was  already  there,  the  mules  fed,  and  he  was 
helpipg  Dewey  Dell  milk.  And  when  I  saw  him  I  knew 
that  he  knew  what  it  was.  Now  and  then  I  would  catch 
him  watching  Jewel  with  a  queer  look,  like  having  found 
out  where  Jewel  went  and  what  he  was  doing  had  given 
him  something  to  really  think  about  at  last.  But  it  was 
not  a  worried  look;  it  was  the  kind  of  look  I  would  see 
on  him  when  I  would  find  him  doing  some  of  Jewel's 
work  around  the  house,  work  that  pa  still  thought  Jewel 
was  doing  and  that  ma  thought  Dewey  Dell  was  doing. 
So  I  said  nothing  to  him,  believing  that  when  he  got  done 
digesting  it  in  his  mind,  he  would  tell  me.  But  he  never 
did. 

One  morning — it  was  November  then,  five  months 
since  it  started — Jewel  was  not  in  bed  and  he  didn't  join 
us  in  the  field.  That  was  the  first  time  ma  learned  any- 
thing about  what  had  been  going  on.  She  sent  Vardaman 
down  to  find  where  Jewel  was,  and  after  a  while  she  came 
down  too.  It  was  as  though,  so  long  as  the  deceit  ran 
along  quiet  and  monotonous,  all  of  us  let  ourselves  be  de- 
ceived, abetting  it  unawares  or  maybe  through  coward- 


AS      I     LAY      DYING  433 

ice,  since  all  people  are  cowards  and  naturally  prefer  any 
kind  of  treachery  because  it  has  a  bland  outside.  But 
now  it  was  like  we  had  all — and  by  a  kind  of  telepathic 
agreement  of  admitted  fear — flung  the  whole  thing  back 
like  covers  on  the  bed  and  we  all  sitting  bolt  upright  in 
our  nakedness,  staring  at  one  another  and  saying  "Now 
is  the  truth.  He  hasn't  come  home.  Something  has  hap- 
pened  to  him.  We  let  something  happen  to  him/' 

Then  we  saw  him.  He  came  up  along  the  ditch  and 
then  turned  straight  across  the  field,  riding  the  horse.  Its 
mane  and  tail  were  going,  as  though  in  motion  they  were 
carrying  out  the  splotchy  pattern  of  its  coat:  he  looked 
like  he  was  riding  on  a  big  pinwheel,  barebacked,  with  a 
rope  bridle,  and  no  hat  on  his  head.  It  was  a  descendant 
of  those  Texas  ponies  Flem  Snopes  brought  here  twenty- 
five  years  ago  and  auctioned  off  for  two  dollars  a  head 
and  nobody  but  old  Lon  Quick  ever  caught  his  and  still 
owned  some  of  the  blood  because  he  could  never  give  it 
away. 

He  galloped  up  and  stopped,  his  heels  in  the  horsed 
ribs  and  it  dancing  and  swirling  like  the  shape  of  its  mane 
and  tail  and  the  splotches  of  its  coat  had  nothing  what- 
ever to  do  with  the  flesh-and-bone  horse  inside  them,  and 
he  sat  there,  looking  at  us. 

"Where  did  you  get  that  horse?"  pa  said. 

"Bought  it,"  Jewel  said.  "From  Mr.  Quick." 

"Bought  it?"  pa  said,  "With  what?  Did  you  buy  that 
thing  on  my  word?" 

"It  was  my  money,"  Jewel  said.  "I  earned  it.  You  won't 
need  to  worry  about  it.9* 

"Jewel,"  ma  said;  "Jewel/* 

"Tit's  all  right,"  Cash  said.  "He  earned  the  money.  H© 
cieaned  up  that  forty  acres  of  new  ground  Quick  laid  out 
last  spring.  He  did  it  single-handed,  working  at  night  by 


454  AS     I     LAY     DYING 

lantern.  I  saw  him.  So  I  don't  reckon  that  horse  cost  any- 
body anything  except  Jewel.  I  don't  reckon  we  need 
worry." 

"Jewel/'  ma  said.  "Jewel "  Then  she  said:  <eYou 

come  right  to  the  house  and  go  to  bed." 

"Not  yet,"  Jewel  said.  *1  ain't  got  time.  I  got  to  get  me  a 
iiaddle  and  bridle.  Mr.  Quick  says  he— — " 

"Jewel,"  ma  said,  looking  at  him.  "Ill  give — I'll  give — 
give "  Then  she  began  to  cry.  She  cried  hard,  not  hid- 
ing her  face,  standing  there  in  her  faded  wrapper,  look- 
ing at  him  and  him  on  the  horse,  looking  down  at  her, 
his  face  growing  cold  and  a  little  sick  looking  until  he 
looked  away  quick  and  Cash  came  and  touched  her. 

"You  go  on  to  the  house,"  Cash  said.  "This  here  ground 
is  too  wet  for  you.  You  go  on,  now."  She  put  her  hands  to 
her  face  then  and  after  a  while  she  went  on,  stumbling  a 
little  on  the  ploughmarks.  But  pretty  soon  she  straight- 
ened up  and  went  on.  She  didn't  look  back.  When  she 
reached  the  ditch  she  stopped  and  called  Vardaman.  He 
was  looking  at  the  horse,  kind  of  dancing  up  and  down 
by  it. 

**Let  me  ride,  Jewel,"  he  said.  "Let  me  ride,  Jewel.97 

Jewel  looked  at  him,  then  he  looked  away  again,  hold- 
ing the  horse  reined  back.  Pa  watched  him,  mumbling  his 

% 

"So  you  bought  a  horse/*  he  said.  "You  went  behind  my 
tack  and  bought  a  horse.  You  never  consulted  me;  you 
Icnow  how  tight  it  is  for  us  to  make  by,  yet  you  bought 
a  horse  for  me  to  feed.  Taken  the  work  from  your  flesli 
and  blood  and  bought  a  horse  with  it." 

Jewel  looked  at  pa,  his  eyes  paler  than  ever. 

"He  won't  never  eat  a  mouthful  of  yours,"  he  said.  **Not 
a  mouthful.  I'll  kill  him  first  Don't  you  never  think  it. 
Don't  you  never/' 


AS     I     LAY     DYING  435 

**Let  me  ride,  Jewel/'  Vardaman  said.  "Let  me  ride» 
Jewel/'  He  sounded  like  a  cricket  in  the  grass,  a  little  one. 
"Let  me  ride,  Jewel" 

That  night  I  found  ma  sitting  beside  the  bed  where  he 
was  sleeping,  in  the  dark.  She  cried  hard,  maybe  be- 
cause she  had  to  cry  so  quiet;  maybe  because  she  felt  the 
same  way  about  tears  she  did  about  deceit,  hating  herself 
for  doing  it,  hating  him  because  she  had  to.  And  then  I 
knew  that  I  knew,  I  knew  that  as  plain  on  that  day  as  I 
knew  about  Dewey  Dell  on  that  day. 


TULL 


SO  THEY  FINALLY  GOT  ANSE  TO  SAY  WHAT  HE  WANTED  TO 
do,  and  him  and  the  gal  and  the  boy  got  out  of  the 
wagon.  But  even  when  we  were  on  the  bridge  Anse  kept 
on  looking  back,  like  he  thought  maybe,  once  he  was 
outen  the  wagon,  the  whole  thing  would  kind  of  blow  up 
and  he  would  find  himself  back  yonder  in  the  field  again 
and  her  laying  up  there  in  the  house,  waiting  to  die  and  it 
to  do  all  over  again. 

"You  ought  to  let  them  taken  your  mule,"  he  says,  and 
the  bridge  shaking  and  swaying  under  us,  going  down 
into  the  moiling  water  like  it  went  clean  through  to  the 
other  side  of  tie  earth,  and  the  other  end  coming  up 
outen  the  water  like  it  wasn't  the  same  bridge  a-tall  and 
that  them  that  would  walk  up  outen  the  water  on  that 
side  must  come  from  the  bottom  of  the  earth.  But  It  was 


AS     1     LAY     BYIXG 

still  whole;  you  could  tell  that  by  the  way  when  this  end 
swagged,  It  didn't  look  like  the  other  end  swagged  at 
all:  just  like  the  other  trees  and  the  bank  yonder  were 
swinging  back  and  forth  slow  like  on  a  big  clock.  And 
them  logs  scraping  and  bumping  at  the  sunk  part  and 
tilting  end-up  and  shooting  clean  outen  the  water  and 
tumbling  on  toward  the  ford  and  the  waiting,  slick,  whirl- 
ing, and  foamy. 

"What  good  would  that  'a'  done?"  I  says.  "If  your  team 
can't  find  the  ford  and  haul  it  across,  what  good  would 
three  mules  or  even  ten  mules  do?" 

"I  ami  asking  it  of  you,"  he  says.  "I  can  always  do  for 
me  and  mine.  I  ain't  asking  you  to  risk  your  mule.  It  ain't 
your  dead;  I  am  not  blaming  you." 

'They  ought  to  went  back  and  laid  over  until  tomor- 
row," I  says.  The  water  was  cold.  It  was  thick,  like  slush 
ice.  Only  it  kind  of  lived.  One  part  of  you  knowed  it 
was  just  water,  the  same  thing  that  had  been  running 
under  this  same  bridge  for  a  long  time,  yet  when  them 
logs  would  come  spewing  up  outen  it,  you  were  not  sur- 
prised, like  they  was  a  part  of  water,  of  the  waiting  and 
the  threat. 

It  was  like  when  we  was  across,  up  out  of  the  water 
again  and  the  hard  earth  under  us,  that  I  was  surprised. 
It  was  like  we  hadn't  expected  the  bridge  to  end  on  the 
other  bank,  on  something  tame  like  the  hard  earth  again 
that  we  had  tromped  on  before  this  time  and  knowed 
well.  Like  it  couldn't  be  me  here,  because  I'd  have  had 
better  sense  than  to  done  what  I  just  done.  And  when  I 
looked  back  and  saw  the  other  bank  and  saw  my  mule 
standing  there  where  I  used  to  be  and  knew  that  I'd 
have  to  get  back  there  some  way,  I  knew  it  couldn't 
be,  because  I  just  couldn't  think  of  anything  that  could 
make  me  cross  that  bridge  ever  even  once*  Yet  here  I  was, 


AS     I     LAY     DYIIsTO  437 

and  the  fellow  that  could  make  himself  cross  it  twice, 
couldn't  be  me,  not  even  if  Cora  told  him  to. 

It  was  that  boy.  I  said  "Here;  you  better  take  a  holt  o£ 
my  hand,"  and  lie  waited  and  held  to  me.  I  be  dum  if  it 
wasn't  like  he  come  back  and  got  me;  like  he  was  saying 
They  won't  nothing  hurt  you.  Like  he  was  saying  about 
a  fine  place  he  knowed  where  Christmas  come  twice  with 
Thanksgiving  and  lasts  on  through  the  winter  and  the 
spring  and  the  summer,  and  if  I  just  stayed  with  him  I'd 
be  all  right  too. 

When  I  looked  back  at  my  mule  it  was  like  he  was  one 
of  these  here  spy-glasses  and  I  could  look  at  him  stand- 
ing there  and  see  all  the  broad  land  and  my  house 
sweated  outen  it  like  it  was  the  more  die  sweat,  the 
broader  the  land;  the  more  the  sweat,  the  tighter  the 
house  because  it  would  take  a  tight  house  for  Cora,  to 
hold  Cora  like  a  jar  of  milk  in  the  spring:  you've  got  to 
have  a  tight  jar  01  you'll  need  a  powerful  spring,  if  you 
have  a  big  spring,  why  then  you  have  the  incentive  to 
have  tight,  well-made  jars,  because  it  is  your  milk,  sour  or 
not,  because  you  would  rather  have  milk  that  will  sour 
than  to  have  milk  that  won't,  because  you  are  a  man. 

And  him  holding  to  my  hand,  his  hand  that  hot  and 
confident,  so  that  I  was  like  to  say:  Look-a-here.  Can't 
you  see  that  mule  yonder?  He  never  had  no  business  ove* 
here,  so  he  never  come,  not  being  nothing  but  a  mule. 
Because  a  fellow  can  see  ever  now  and  then  that  children 
have  more  sense  than  him.  But  he  don't  like  to  admit  it 
to  them  until  they  have  beards.  After  they  have  a  beard, 
they  are  too  busy  because  they  don't  know  if  they'll  ever 
quite  make  it  back  to  where  they  were  in  sense  before 
they  was  haired,  so  you  don't  mind  admitting  then  to 
folks  that  are  worrying  about  the  same  thing  that  ain't 
worth  the  worry  that  you  are  yourself. 


AS     I     LAY     DYING 

Then  we  was  over  and  we  stood  there,  looking  at  Cash 
turning  the  wagon  around.  We  watched  them  drive  back 
down  the  road  to  where  the  trail  turned  off  into  the  bot- 
tom. After  a  while  the  wagon  was  out  of  sight. 

"We  better  get  on  down  to  the  ford  and  git  ready  to 
help,"  I  said. 

"I  give  her  my  word/'  Anse  says.  "It  is  sacred  on  me.  I 
know  you  begrudge  it,  but  she  will  bless  you  in  heaven." 

*Well,  they  got  to  finish  circumventing  the  land  before 
they  can  dare  the  water,"  I  said.  "Come  on." 

T±'s  the  turning  back/'  he  said.  "It  ain't  no  luck  in  turn- 
ing back." 

He  was  standing  there,  humped,  mournful,  looking 
at  the  empty  road  beyond  the  swagging  and  swaying 
bridge.  And  that  gal,  too,  with  the  lunch-basket  on  one 
arm  and  that  package  under  the  other.  Just  going  to 
town.  Bent  on  it.  They  would  risk  the  fire  and  the  earth 
and  the  water  and  all  just  to  eat  a  sack  of  bananas.  "You 
ought  to  laid  over  a  day,"  I  said.  "It  would  V  fell  some 
by  morning.  It  mought  not  'a'  rained  tonight.  And  it  can't 
get  no  higher." 

"I  give  my  promise,"  he  says.  "She  is  counting  on  it.9* 


DARL 


BEFOBE  US  THE  THICK  DARK  CURRENT  RUNS.  IT  TALKS  UF 
to  us  in  a  murmur  become  ceaseless  and  myriad,  the 
yellow  surface  dimpled  monstrously  into  fading  swirls 
travelling  along  the  surface  for  an  instant,  silent,  imper- 


AS     I     E&Y     BYING  439 

manent  and  profoundly  significant,  as  though  just  be- 
neath the  surface  something  huge  and  alive  waked  for  a 
moment  of  lazy  alertness  out  of  and  into  light  slumber 
again. 

It  clucks  and  murmurs  among  the  spokes  and  about 
the  mules*  knees,  yellow,  scummed  with  flotsam  and 
with  thick  soiled  gouts  of  foam  as  though  it  had  sweat, 
lathering,  like  a  driven  horse.  Through  the  undergrowth, 
it  goes  with  a  plaintive  sound,  a  musing  sound;  in  It  the 
unwinded  cane  and  saplings  lean  as  before  a  little  gale, 
swaying  without  reflections  as  though  suspended  on  in- 
visible wires  from  the  branches  overhead.  Above  the 
ceaseless  surface  they  stand — trees,  cane,  vines — rootless, 
severed  from  the  earth,  spectral  above  a  scene  of  im<- 
mense  yet  circumscribed  desolation  filled  with  the  voice 
o£  the  waste  and  mournful  water. 

Cash  and  I  sit  in  the  wagon;  Jewel  sits  the  horse  at 
the  off  rear-wheel.  The  horse  is  trembling,  its  eye  rolling 
wild  and  baby-blue  in  its  long  pink  face,  its  breathing 
stertorous  like  groaning.  He  sits  erect,  poised,  looking 
quietly  and  steadily  and  quickly  this  way  and  that,  his 
face  calm.,  a  little  pale,  alert.  Cash's  face  is  also  gravely 
composed;  he  and  I  look  at  one  another  with  long  prob- 
ing looks,  looks  that  plunge  unimpeded  through  one  an- 
other's eyes  and  into  the  ultimate  secret  place  where  for 
an  instant  Cash  and  Darl  crouch  flagrant  and  unabashed 
in  all  the  old  terror  and  the  old  foreboding,  alert  and 
secret  and  without  shame.  When  we  speak  our  voices  are 
quiet,  detached. 

"I  reckon  we're  still  in  the  road,  all  right." 

"Tull  taken  and  cut  them  two  big  whiteoaks.  I  heard 
tell  how  at  high  water  in  the  old  days  they  used  to  line 
•up  the  ford  by  them  trees." 

"I  reckon  he  did  that  two  years  ago  when  he  was  log 


44°  AS     I     LAY     DYING 

ging  down  here.  I  reckon  lie  never  thought  that  anybody 
would  ever  use  this  ford  again." 

"I  reckon  not.  Yes,  it  must  have  been  then.  He  cut  a 
sight  of  timber  outen  here  then.  Payed  off  that  mortgage 
With  it,  I  hear  tell." 

"Yes.  Yes,  I  reckon  so.  I  reckon  Vemon  could  have 
done  that/5 

"That's  a  fact  Most  folks  that  logs  in  this  here  country, 
they  need  a  durn  good  farm  to  support  the  sawmill.  Or 
maybe  a  store.  But  I  reckon  Vemon  could/' 

"I  reckon  so.  He's  a  sight/7 

"Ay.  Vemon  is.  Yes,  it  must  still  be  here.  He  never 
would  have  got  that  timber  out  of  here  if  he  hadn't 
cleaned  out  that  old  road.  I  reckon  we  are  still  on  it/' 
He  looks  about  quietly,  at  the  position  of  the  trees,  lean- 
ing this  way  and  that,  looking  back  along  the  floorless 
road  shaped  vaguely  high  in  air  by  the  position  of  the 
lopped  and  felled  trees,  as  if  the  road  too  had  been 
soaked  free  of  earth  and  floated  upward,  to  leave  in  its 
spectral  tracing  a  monument  to  a  still  more  profound  des- 
olation than  this  above  which  we  now  sit,  talking  quietly 
of  old  security  and  old  trivial  things.  Jewel  looks  at  hirr^ 
then  at  me,  then  his  face  turns  in  in  that  quiet,  constant, 
questing  about  the  scene,  the  horse  trembling  quietly  and 
steadily  between  his  knees. 

"He  could  go  on  ahead  slow  and  sort  of  feel  it  out,"  J 
say. 

"Yes,"  Cash  says,  not  looking  at  me.  His  face  is  in 
profile  as  he  looks  forward  where  Jewel  has  moved  on 
ahead. 

"He  can't  miss  the  river/'  I  say.  "He  couldn't  miss  seeing 
it  fifty  yards  ahead/* 

Cash  does  not  look  at  me,  his  face  in  profile.  'If  I'd 


AS     I     JLAY     DYING  441 

just  suspicioned  It,  I  coald  'a'  come  down  last  week  and 
taken  a  sight  on  it." 

"The  bridge  was  up  then,"  I  say.  He  does  not  look  at 
me.  "Whitfield  crossed  it  a-horse-back." 

Jewel  looks  at  us  again,  his  expression  sober  and  alert 
and  subdued.  His  voice  is  quiet,  "What  you  want  me  to 

dor 

"I  ought  to  come  down  last  week  and  taken  a  sight  on 
it,"  Cash  says. 

"We  couldn't  have  known,"  I  say.  "There  wasn't  any 
way  for  us  to  know.3' 

"I'll  ride  on  ahead,"  Jewel  says.  "You  can  follow  where 
I  am."  He  lifts  the  horse.  It  shrinks,  bowed;  he  leans  to  It, 
speaking  to  it,  lifting  it  forward  almost  bodily,  it  setting 
its  feet  down  with  gingerly  splashings,  trembling,  breath- 
ing harshly.  He  speaks  to  it,  murmurs  to  it.  "Go  on,"  he 
says.  "I  ain't  going  to  let  nothing  hurt  you.  Go  on,  now.'' 

"Jewel,"  Cash  says.  Jewel  does  not  look  back.  He  lifts 
the  horse  on. 

"He  can  swim,"  I  say.  'If  he'll  just  give  the  horse  Ome^ 
anyhow . . ."  When  he  was  born,  he  had  a  bad  time  of  it. 
Ma  would  sit  in  the  lamplight,  holding  him  on  a  pillow 
on  her  lap.  We  would  wake  and  find  her  so.  There  would 
be  no  sound  from  them. 

"That  pillow  was  longer  than  him."  Cash  says.  He  is 
leaning  a  little  forward.  "I  ought  to  come  down  ksf 
week  and  sighted.  I  ought  to  done  it." 

"That's  right,"  I  say.  "Neither  his  feet  nor  his  head 
would  reach  the  end  of  it.  You  couldn't  have  known/'  I 
say. 

"I  ought  to  done  it,"  he  says.  He  lifts  the  reins.  The 
mules  move,  into  the  traces;  the  wheels  murmur  alive  in 
the  water.  He  looks  back  and  down  at  Addie.  "It  ain't  on 
a  balance,"  he  says. 


AS     I     LAY     DY13STG 

At  last  the  trees  open;  against  the  open  river  Jewel  sits 
!he  horse,  half  turned,  It  belly  deep  BOW.  Across  the  river 
we  can  see  Vemon  and  pa  and  Vardaman  and  Dewey 
Dell.  Vernon  is  waving  at  us,  waving  us  further  do\vn- 
jstream. 

"We  are  too  high  up/?  Cash  says.  Vernon  is  shouting 
too,  but  we  cannot  make  out  what  he  says  for  the  noise 
of  the  water.  It  runs  steady  and  deep  now,  unbroken, 
without  sense  of  motion  until  a  log  comes  along,  turning 
slowly.  "Watch  it,"  Cash  says.  We  watch,  it  and  see  it  falter 
and  hang  for  a  moment,  the  current  building  up  behind 
it  in  a  thick  wave,  submerging  it  for  an  instant  before  it 
shoots  up  and  tumbles  on. 

"There  it  is,"  I  say. 

"Ay,"  Cash  says.  "It's  there."  We  look  at  Vernon  again. 
He  is  now  flapping  his  arms  up  and  down.  We  move  oil 
downstream,  slowly  and  carefully,  watching  Vernon.  He 
drops  his  hands.  "This  is  the  place/'  Cash.  says. 

"Well,  goddamn  it,  lets  get  across,  then,"  Jewel  says.  He 
moves  the  horse  on. 

"You  wait,"  Cash  says.  Jewel  stops  again. 

"Well,  by  God "  he  says.  Cash  looks  at  the  water, 

then  he  looks  back  at  Addie.  "It  ain't  on  a  balance,"  he 
says. 

"Then  go  on  back  to  the  goddamn  bridge  and  walk 
across/'  Jewel  says.  "You  and  Darl  both.  Let  me  on  that 
wagon." 

Cash  does  not  pay  him  any  attention.  "It  ain't  on  a, 
balance/'  he  says.  "Yes,  sir.  We  got  to  watch  it." 

"Watch  it,  hell,"  Jewel  says.  "You  get  out  of  that  wagon 
and  let  me  have  it.  By  God,  if  you're  afraid  to  drive  it 
over  .  .  /'  His  eyes  are  pale  as  two  bleached  chips  in  Ms 
face.  Cash  is  looking  at  him. 


A*?     I     LAY     DYING  443 

"We'll  get  it  over/'  he  says.  "I  tell  you  what  you  do.  You 
ride  on  back  and  walk  across  the  bridge  and  come  down 
the  other  bank  and  meet  us  with  the  rope.  VernonTI  take 
your  horse  home  with  him  and  keep  it  till  we  get  back/* 

"You  go  to  hell/'  Jewel  says. 

"You  take  the  rope  and  come  down  the  bank  and  be 
ready  with  it,"  Cash  says.  "Three  can't  do  no  more  than 
two  can — one  to  drive  and  one  to  steady  it." 

"Goddamn  you/7  Jewel  says. 

"Let  Jewel  take  the  end  of  the  rope  and  cross  upstream 
of  us  and  brace  it/*  I  say.  "WiU  you  do  that,  Jewel?" 

Jewel  watches  me,  hard.  He  looks  quick  at  Cash,  then 
back  at  me,  his  eyes  alert  and  hard.  "I  don't  give  a  damn. 
Just  so  we  do  something.  Setting  here,  not  lifting  a  god* 
damn  hand  .  .  ." 

"Let's  do  that,  Cash/"  I  say. 

"I  reckon  well  have  to/'  Cash  says. 

The  river  itself  is  not  a  hundred  yards  across,  and  pa 
and  Vemon  and  Vardaman  and  Dewey  Dell  are  the 
only  things  in  sight  not  of  that  single  monotony  of  desola- 
tion leaning  with  that  terrific  quality  a  little  from  right 
to  left,  as  though  we  had  reached  the  place  where  the 
motion  of  the  wasted  world  accelerates  just  before  the 
final  precipice.  Yet  they  appear  dwarfed.  It  is  as  though 
the  space  between  us  were  time:  an  irrevocable  quality. 
It  is  as  though  time,  no  longer  running  straight  before  us 
in  a  diminishing  line,  now  runs  parallel  between  us  like 
a  looping  string,  the  distance  being  the  doubling  accre- 
tion of  the  thread  and  not  the  interval  between.  The 
mules  stand,  their  forequarters  already  sloped  a  little, 
their  rumps  high.  They  too  are  breathing  now  with  a 
deep  groaning  sound;  looking  back  once,  their  gaze 
sweeps  across  us  with  in  their  eyes  a  wild,  sad,  profound 


444  AS     I     LAY     DYING 

and  despairing  quality  as  though  they  had  already  seen 
ia  the  thick  water  the  shape  of  the  disaster  which  they 
could  not  speak  and  we  could  not  see. 

Cash  turns  back  into  the  wagon.  He  lays  his  hands  flat 
on  Addie,  rocking  her  a  little.  His  face  is  calm,  down- 
sloped,  calculant,  concerned.  He  lifts  his  box  of  tools 
and  wedges  it  forward  under  the  seat;  together  we  shove 
Addie  forward,  wedging  her  between  the  tools  and  the 
wagon-bed.  Then  he  looks  at  me. 

"No,"  I  say.  "I  reckon  I'll  stay.  Might  take  both  of  us/3 

From  the  tool-box  he  takes  his  coiled  rope  and  carries 
the  end  twice  around  the  seat  stanchion  and  passes  the 
end  to  me  without  tying  it.  The  other  end  he  pays  out  to 
Jewel,  who  takes  a  turn  about  his  saddle-horn. 

He  must  force  the  horse  down  into  the  current.  It 
moves,  high-kneed,  arch-necked,  boring  and  chafing. 
Jewel  sits  lightly  forward,  his  knees  lifted  a  little;  again  his 
swift  alert  calm  gaze  sweeps  upon  us  and  on*  He  lowers 
the  horse  into  the  stream,  speaking  to  it  in  a  soothing 
murmur.  The  horse  slips,  goes  under  to  the  saddle,  surges 
to  its  feet  again,  the  current  building  up  against  Jewel's 
thighs. 

**Watch  yourself/*  Cash  says. 

"I'm  on  It  now/'  Jewel  says.  <cYou  can  come  ahead 
now." 

Cash  takes  the  reins  and  lowers  the  team  carefully  and 
skilfully  into  the  stream. 

I  felt  the  current  take  us  and  I  knew  we  were  on  the 
ford  by  that  reason,  since  it  was  only  by  means  of  that 
slipping  contact  that  we  could  tell  that  we  were  in  mo- 
tion at  all.  What  liad  once  been  a  flat  surface  was  now  a 
succession  of  troughs  and  hillocks  lifting  and  falling 
about  us,  shoving  at  us,  teasing  at  us  with  light  lazy 


AS     I     LAY     DYING  445 

touches  in  the  vain  instants  of  solidity  underfoot.  Cash 
looked  back  at  me,  and  then  I  knew  that  we  were  gone. 
But  I  did  not  realize  the  reason  for  the  rope  until  I  saw 
the  log.  It  surged  up  out  of  the  water  and  stood  for  an 
instant  upright  upon  that  surging  and  heaving  desolation 
like  Christ.  Get  out  and  let  the  current  take  you  down  to 
the  bend,  Cash  said.  You  can  make  it  all  right.  No9  I 
said,  Td  get  just  as  wet  that  way  as  this. 

The  log  appears  suddenly  between  two  hills,  as  if  it 
had  rocketed  suddenly  from  the  bottom  of  the  river, 
Upon  the  end  of  it  a  long  gout  of  foam  hangs  like  the 
beard  of  an  old  man  or  a  goat.  When  Cash  speaks  to  me 
I  know  that  he  has  been  watching  it  all  the  time,  watch- 
ing it  and  watching  Jewel  ten  feet  ahead  of  us.  "Let  the 
rope  go/'  he  says.  With  his  other  hand  he  reaches  down 
and  reeves  the  two  turns  from  the  stanchion.  "Ride  on, 
Jewel/'  he  says;  "see  if  you  can  pull  us  ahead  of  the  log/1 

Jewel  shouts  at  the  horse;  again  he  appears  to  lift  It 
bodily  between  his  knees.  He  is  just  above  the  top  of  the 
ford  and  the  horse  has  a  purchase  of  some  sort  for  il 
surges  forward,  shining  wetly  half  out  of  water,  crashing 
on  in  a  succession  of  lunges.  It  moves  unbelievably  fast; 
by  that  token  Jewel  realizes  at  last  that  the  rope  is  free, 
for  I  can  see  him  sawing  back  on  the  reins,  his  head 
turned,  as  the  log  rears  in  a  long  sluggish  lunge  between 
us,  bearing  down  upon  the  team.  They  see  it  too;  for  a 
moment  they  also  shine  black  out  of  water.  Then  the 
do^vnstream  one  vanishes,  dragging  the  other  with  him; 
the  wagon  sheers  crosswise,  poised  on  the  crest  of  the 
ford  as  the  log  strikes  it,  tilting  it  up  and  on.  Cash  is  half 
turned,  the  reins  running  taut  from  his  hand  and  disap- 
pearing into  the  water,  the  other  hand  reached  back 
upon  Addie,  holding  her  jammed  over  against  the  higb 


AS     I     LAY     DYIHG 

side  of  the  wagon.  "Jump  clear,"  he  says  quietly.  "Stay 
away  from  the  team  and  don't  try  to  fight  it.  It'll  swing 
you  into  the  bend  all  right.'* 

**You  come  too,"  I  say.  Vemon  and  Vardaman  are  run- 
ning along  the  bank,  pa  and  Dewey  Dell  stand  watching 
us,  Dewey  Dell  with  the  basket  and  the  package  in  her 
arms.  Jewel  is  trying  to  fight  the  horse  back.  The  head  of 
one  mule  appears,  its  eyes  wide;  it  looks  back  at  us  for  an 
instant,  making  a  sound  almost  human.  The  head  van- 
ishes again. 

"Back,  Jewel,**  Cash  shouts.  TBack,  Jewel/*  For  another 
instant  I  see  him  leaning  to  the  tilting  wagon,  his  arm 
braced  back  against  Addie  and  his  tools;  I  see  the 
bearded  head  of  the  rearing  log  strike  up  again,  and  be- 
yond it  Jewel  holding  the  horse  upreared,  its  head 
wrenched  around,  hammering  its  head  with  his  fist.  I 
jump  from  the  wagon  on  the  downstream  side.  Between 
two  hills  I  see  the  mules  once  more.  They  roll  up  out  of 
the  water  in  succession,  turning  completely  over,  theii 
legs  stiffly  extended  as  when  they  had  lost  contact  with 
the  earth. 


VARDAMAN 


CASH  TRIED  BUT  SHE  FELL,  OFF  AND  DARL  JUMPED  GO 
ing  under  he  went  under  and  Cash  hollering  to  catch 
her  and  I  hollering  running  and  hollering  and  Dewey 
Dell  hollering  at  me  Vardaman  you  vardaman  you  varda* 


AS     I     LA*"     DYING  44? 

man  and  Vemon  passed  me  because  hie  was  seeing  h& 
come  up  and  she  jumped  into  the  water  again,  and 
Darl  hadn't  caught  her  yet 

He  came  up  to  see  ant.  I  hollering  catch  her  Dar!  catch 
her  and  he  didn't  come  back  because  she  was  too  heavy 
he  had  to  go  on  catching  at  her  and  I  hollering  catch  her 
darl  catch  her  darl  because  in  the  water  she  could  go 
faster  than  a  man  and  Darl  had  to  grabble  for  her  so  J 
knew  he  could  catch  her  because  he  is  the  best  grabble* 
even  with  the  mules  in  the  way  again  they  dived  up  roll- 
ing their  feet  stiff  rolling  down  again  and  their  backs  up 
now  and  Darl  had  to  again  because  in  the  water  she 
could  go  faster  than  a  man  or  a  woman  and  I  passed  Ver- 
non  and  he  wouldn't  get  in  the  water  and  help  Darl  he 
would  grabble  for  her  with  Darl  he  knew  but  he 
wouldn't  help 

The  mules  dived  up  again  diving  their  legs  stiff  their 
stiff  legs  rolling  slow  and  then  Darl  again  and  I  hollering 
catch  her  darl  catch  her  head  her  into  the  bank  darj 
and  Vernon  wouldn't  help  and  then  Darl  dodged  past  the 
mules  where  he  could  he  had  her  under  the  water  coming 
in  to  the  bank  coming  in  slow  because  in  the  water  she 
fought  to  stay  under  the  water  but  Darl  is  strong  and  he 
was  coming  in  slow  and  so  I  knew  he  had  her  because  he 
came  slow  and  I  ran  down  into  the  water  to  help  and  I 
couldn't  stop  hollering  because  Darl  was  strong  and 
steady  holding  her  under  the  water  even  if  she  did  fight 
he  would  not  let  her  go  he  was  seeing  me  and  he  would 
hold  her  and  it  was  all  right  now  it  was  all  right  now  it 
was  all  right 

Then  he  comes  up  out  of  the  water.  He  comes  a  long 
way  up  slow  before  his  hands  do  but  he's  got  to  have 
her  got  to  so  I  can  bear  it.  Then  his  hands  come  up  and 
all  of  him  above  the  water.  I  cant  stop.  I  have  not  got 


44s  AS     I     LAY 

Ume  to  try.  I  will  try  to  when  I  can  but  Ms  hands  came 
mipttf  out  of  the  water  emptying  the  wat&r  emptying 
uway 

"Where  is  may  Darl?**  I  said.  Tou  never  got  her.  You 
knew  she  is  a  fish  but  you  let  her  get  away.  You  never 
got  her.  Darl.  DarL  Bar!/'  I  began  to  run  along  the  bank; 
watching  the  mules  dive  up  slow  again  and  then  down 
again. 


TULL 


WHEN  I  TOLD  COBA  HOW  DAKL  JUMPED  OUT  OF  THE 
wagon  and  left  Cash  sitting  there  trying  to  save  it 
and  the  wagon  turning  over,  and  Jewel  that  was  almost 
to  the  bank  fighting  that  horse  back  where  it  had  more 
sense  than  to  go,  she  says  "And  you're  one  of  the  folktf 
that  says  Darl  is  the  queer  one,  the  one  that  ain't  bright, 
and  him  the  only  one  of  them  that  had  sense  enough  to 
get  off  that  wagon.  I  notice  Anse  was  too  smart  to  been 
on  it  a-tall." 

"He  couldn*t  V  done  no  good,  if  he'd  been  there/*  I 
said.  "They  was  going  about  it  right  and  they  would 
have  made  it  if  it  hadn't  a-been  for  that  log.'* 

"Log,  fiddlesticks/'  Cora  said.  "It  was  the  hand  of 
God." 

"Then  how  can  you  say  it  was  f oolish?"  I  said.  "Nobody 
can't  guard  against  the  hand  of  God.  It  would  be  sacri- 
kge  to  try  to.* 


AS     1     LAY     DYING  449 

Then  why  dare  It?"  Cora  says.  "Tell  me  that" 

<cAnse  didn't/'  I  said.  '"That's  just  what  you  faulted  him 
for." 

**His  place  was  there/7  Cora  said.  *If  he  had  been  a 
man,  he  would  V  been  there  instead  of  making  his  sons 
do  what  he  dursn't." 

"I  don't  know  what  you  want,  then/'  I  said,  "One 
bieath  you  say  they  was  daring  the  hand  of  God  to  try 
it,  and  the  next  breath  you  jump  on  Anse  because  he 
wasn't  with  them."  Then  she  begun  to  sing  again,  work- 
ing at  the  wash-tub,  with  that  singing  look  in  her  face 
like  she  had  done  give  up  folks  and  all  their  foolishness 
and  had  done  went  on  ahead  of  them,  marching  up  the 
sky,  singing. 

The  wagon  hung  for  a  long  time  while  the  current 
built  up  under  it,  shoving  it  off  the  ford,  and  Cash  lean- 
ing more  and  more,  trying  to  keep  the  coffin  braced  so  it 
wouldn't  slip  down  and  finish  tilting  the  wagon  over. 
Soon  as  the  wagon  got  tilted  good,  to  where  the  current 
could  finish  it,  the  log  went  on.  It  headed  around  the 
wagon  and  went  on  good  as  a  swimming  man  could  have 
done.  It  was  like  it  had  been  sent  there  to  do  a  job  and 
done  it  and  went  on. 

When  the  mules  finally  kicked  loose,  it  looked  for  a 
minute  like  maybe  Cash  would  get  the  wagon  back.  It 
looked  like  him  and  the  wagon  wasn't  moving  at  all,  and 
just  Jewel  fighting  that  horse  back  to  the  wagon.  Then 
that  boy  passed  me,  running  and  hollering  at  Darl  and 
the  gal  trying  to  catch  him,  and  then  I  see  the  inules  come 
rolling  slow  up  out  of  the  water,  their  legs  spraddled 
stiff  like  they  had  balked  upside  down,  and  roll  on  into 
the  water  again. 

Then  the  wagon  tilted  over  and  then  it  and  Jewel  and 
the  horse  was  all  mixed  up  together.  Cash  went  outen 


45°  AS     I     LAY     DYING 

Sight,  still  holding  the  coffin  braced,  and  then  I  couldn't 
tell  anything  for  the  horse  lunging  and  splashing.  I 
thought  that  Cash  had  give  up  then  and  was  swimming 
for  it  and  I  was  yelling  at  Jewel  to  come  on  back  and  then 
all  of  a  sudden  him  and  the  horse  went  under  too  and  I 
thought  they  was  all  going.  I  knew  that  the  horse  had  got 
dragged  off  the  ford  too,  and  with  that  wild  drowning 
horse  and  that  wagon  and  that  loose  box,  it  was  going  to 
be  pretty  bad,  and  there  I  was,  standing  knee  deep  in 
the  water,  yelling  at  Anse  behind  me:  "See  what  you 
done  now.  See  what  you  done  now?" 

The  horse  come  up  again.  It  was  headed  for  the  bank 
now,  throwing  its  head  up,  and  then  I  saw  one  of  them 
holding  to  the  saddle  on  the  downstream  side,  so  I  started 
^running  along  the  bank,  trying  to  catch  sight  of  Cash  be- 
cause he  couldn't  swim,  yelling  at  Jewel  where  Cash  was 
like  a  durn  fool,  bad  as  that  boy  that  was  on  down  the 
bank  still  hollering  at  Darl. 

So  I  went  down  into  the  water  so  I  could  still  keep 
some  kind  of  a  grip  in  the  mud,  when  I  saw  Jewel  He 
was  middle  deep,  so  I  knew  he  was  on  the  ford,  anyway, 
leaning  hard  upstream,  and  then  I  see  the  rope  and  then 
I  see  the  water  building  up  where  he  was  holding  the 
wagon  snubbed  just  below  the  ford. 

So  it  was  Cash  holding  to  the  horse  when  it  come 
splashing  and  scrambling  up  the  bank,  moaning  and 
groaning  like  a  natural  man.  When  I  come  to  it  it  was 
just  kicking  Cash  loose  from  his  holt  on  the  saddle.  His 
face  turned  up  a  second  when  he  was  sliding  back  into 
the  water.  It  was  grey,  with  his  eyes  closed  and  a  long 
swipe  of  mud  across  his  face.  Then  he  let  go  and  turned 
over  in  the  water.  He  looked  Just  like  an  old  bundle  of 
clothes  kind  of  washing  up  and  down  against  the  bank, 
tie  looked  like  he  was  laying  there  in  the  water  on  his 


AS     T     3LAY     DYING  4JI 

f  ace»  rocking  up  and  down  a  little,  looking  at  something 
on  the  bottom. 

We  could  watch  the  rope  cutting  down  into  the  water, 
and  we  could  feel  the  weight  of  the  wagon  kind  of  blmnp 
and  lunge  lazy  like,  like  it  just  as  soon  as  not,  and  that 
rope  cutting  down  into  the  water  hard  as  a  iron  bar.  We 
could  hear  the  water  hissing  on  it  like  it  was  red  hot. 
Like  it  was  a  straight  iron  bar  stuck  into  the  bottom  and 
us  holding  the  end  of  it,  and  the  wagon  lazing  up  and 
down,  kind  of  pushing  and  prodding  at  us  like  it  had 
come  around  and  got  behind  us,  lazy  like,  like  it  just  as 
soon  as  not  when  it  made  up  its  mind.  There  was  a 
shoat  come  by,  blowed  up  like  a  balloon:  one  of  them 
spotted  shoats  of  Lon  Quick's.  It  bumped  against  the 
rope  like  it  was  a  iron  bar  and  bumped  off  and  went  on, 
and  us  watching  that  rope  slanting  down  into  the  water. 
We  watched  it 


DARL 


CASH  LIES  ON  HIS  BACK  ON  THE  EARTH,  BOS  HEAT  RAISED 
on  a  rolled  garment  His  eyes  are  closed,  his  face  is 
grey,  his  hair  plastered  in  a  smooth  smear  across  his  fore- 
head as  though  done  with  a  paint-brush.  His  face  ap- 
pears sunken  a  little,  sagging  from  the  bony  ridges  of  eye- 
sockets,  nose,  gums,  as  though  the  wetting  had  slacked 
the  firmness  which  had  held  the  sfcin  full;  his  teeth,  set  in 
pale  gums,  are  parted  a  little  as  if  he  had  been  laughing 


452  AS     I     LAY     DYING 

quietly.  He  lies  pole-thin  in  Ms  wet  clothes,  a  little  poo' 
of  vomit  at  his  head  and  a  thread  of  it  running  from  the 
corner  of  his  mouth  and  down  his  cheek  where  he 
couldn't  turn  his  head  quick  or  far  enough,  until  Dewey 
Dell  stoops  and  wipes  it  away  with  the  hem  of  her  dress, 

Jewel  approaches.  He  has  the  plane,  "Vernon  jus! 
found  the  square,"  he  says.  He  looks  down  at  Cash,  drip- 
ping too.  "Ain't  he  talked  none  yet?" 

"He  had  his  saw  and  hammer  and  chalk-line  and  rule/' 
I  say.  "I  know  that" 

Jewel  lays  the  square  down.  Pa  watches  him.  "They 
can't  be  far  away,"  pa  says.  "It  all  went  together.  Was 
there  ere  a  such  misfortunate  man." 

Jewel  does  not  look  at  pa.  "You  better  call  Vardaman 
back  here,"  he  says.  He  looks  at  Cash,  Then  he  turns  and 
goes  away.  "Get  him  to  talk  soon  as  he  can,"  he  says,  "so 
he  can  tell  us  what  else  there  was." 

We  return  to  the  river.  The  wagon  is  hauled  clear,  the 
wheels  chocked  (carefully:  we  all  helped;  it  is  as  though 
upon  the  shabby,  familiar,  inert  shape  of  the  wagon  there 
lingered  somehow,  latent  yet  still  immediate,  that  vio- 
lence which  had  slain  the  mules  that  drew  it  not  an  hour 
since)  above  the  edge  of  the  flood.  In  the  wagon  bed  it 
lies  profoundly,  the  long  pale  planks  hushed  a  little  with 
wetting  yet  still  yellow,  like  gold  seen  through  water, 
save  for  two  long  muddy  smears.  We  pass  it  and  go  on  to 
the  bank. 

One  end  of  the  rope  is  made  fast  to  a  tree.  At  the 
edge  of  the  stream,  knee-deep,  Vardaman  stands,  bent 
forward  a  little,  watching  Vernon  with  rapt  absorption. 
He  has  stopped  yelling  and  he  is  wet  to  the  armpits. 
Vernon  is  at  the  other  end  of  the  rope,  shoulder-deep  in 
the  river,  looking  back  at  Vardaman,  "Further  back  than 


AS     I     LAY     DYIISTG  453 

that/*  he  says.  "You  git  back  by  the  tree  and  hold  the 
rope  for  me,  so  it  can't  slip." 

Vardaman  backs  along  the  rope,  to  the  tree,  moving 
blindly,  watching  Yemon.  When  we  come  up  he  looks  at 
us  once,  his  eyes  round  and  a  little  dazed.  Then  he  looks 
at  Vemon  again  in  that  posture  of  rapt  alertness. 

**I  got  the  hammer  too/*  Vemon  says.  "Looks  like  we 
ought  to  done  already  got  that  chalk-line.  It  ought  to 
floated." 

"Floated  clean  away/'  Jewel  says.  "We  won't  get  it, 
We  ought  to  find  the  saw,  though/7 

"I  reckon  so/'  Vernon  says.  He  looks  at  the  water.  "That 
chalk-line,  too.  What  else  did  he  have?" 

"He  ain't  talked  yet/'  Jewel  says,  entering  the  water.  He 
looks  back  at  me.  *Tou  go  back  and  get  him  roused  up  to 
talk/'  he  says. 

"Pa's  there,"  I  say.  I  follow  Jewel  into  the  water,  along 
the  rope.  It  feels  alive  in  my  hand,  bellied  faintly  in  a 
prolonged  and  resonant  arc.  Vernon  is  watching  me. 

"You  better  go,"  he  says.  "You  better  be  there/' 

"Let's  see  what  else  we  can  get  before  it  washes  on 
down/'  I  say. 

We  hold  to  the  rope,  the  current  curling  and  dimpling 
about  our  shoulders.  But  beneath  that  false  blandness  the 
true  force  of  it  leans  against  us  lazily.  1  had  not  thought 
that  water  in  July  could  be  so  cold.  It  is  like  hands 
moulding  and  prodding  at  the  very  bones.  Vernoa  is 
still  looking  back  toward  the  bank. 

"Reckon  itll  hold  us  all?"  he  says.  We  too  look  back, 
following  the  rigid  bar  of  the  rope  as  It  rises  from  the 
water  to  the  tree  and  Vardaman  crouched  a  little  beside 
it,  watching  us.  'Wish  my  mule  wouldn't  strike  out  foi 
home/'  Vernon  savs. 


454  AS     I     LAY     DYING 

"Come  on/*  Jewel  says.  "Let's  get  outen  here/* 

We  submerge  in  turn,  holding  to  the  rope,  being 
clutched  by  one  another  while  the  cold  wall  of  the 
water  sucks  the  slanting  mud  backward  and  upstream 
from  beneath  our  feet  and  we  are  suspended  so,  groping 
along  the  cold  bottom.  Even  the  mud  there  is  not  still. 
It  has  a  chill,  scouring  quality,  as  though  the  earth  under 
us  were  in  motion  too.  We  touch  and  fumble  at  one 
another's  extended  arms,  letting  ourselves  go  cautiously 
against  the  rope;  or,  erect  in  turn,  watch  the  water  suck 
and  boil  where  one  of  the  other  two  gropes  beneath  the 
surface.  Pa  has  come  down  to  the  shore,  watching  us. 

Vernon  comes  up,  streaming,  his  face  sloped  down  into 
bis  pursed  blowing  mouth.  His  mouth  is  bluish,  like  a  cir- 
cle of  weathered  rubber.  He  has  the  rule. 

"Hell  be  glad  of  that,"  I  say.  "It's  right  new.  He  bought 
it  just  last  month  out  of  the  catalogue/* 

"If  we  just  knowed  for  sho  what  else,"  Vernon  says, 
looking  over  his  shoulder  and  then  turning  to  face 
where  Jewel  had  disappeared.  "Didn't  he  go  down  'fore 
me?"  Vernon  says. 

"I  don't  know,"  I  say.  "I  think  so.  Yes.  Yes,  he  did." 

We  watch  the  thick  curling  surface,  streaming  away 
from  us  in  slow  whorls. 

"Give  him  a  pull  on  the  rope/*  Vernon  says. 

"He's  on  your  end  of  it/'  I  say. 

"Ain't  nobody  on  my  end  of  it,"  he  says. 

"Pull  it  in/'  I  say.  But  he  has  already  done  that,  hold- 
ing the  end  above  the  water;  and  then  we  see  Jewel.  He 
is  ten  yards  away;  he  comes  up,  blowing,  and  looks  at  us, 
tossing  his  long  hair  back  with  a  jerk  of  his  head,  then 
he  looks  toward  the  bank;  we  can  see  him  filling  his 
lungs. 

"Jewel/*  Vernon  says,  not  loud,  but  his  voice  going  full 


AS     I     LAY     DYING  455 

and  clear  along  the  water,  peremptory  yet  tactful.  "If  13 
be  back  here.  Better  come  back." 

Jewel  dives  again.  We  stand  there,  leaning  back  against 
the  current,  watching  the  water  where  he  disappeared., 
holding  the  dead  rope  between  us  Like  two  men  holding 
the  nozzle  of  a  fire-hose,  waiting  for  the  water.  Suddenly 
Dewey  Dell  is  behind  us  in  the  water.  "You  make  him 
come  back/'  she  says.  "Jewel!"  she  says.  He  comes  up 
again,  tossing  his  hair  back  from  his  eyes.  He  is  swim- 
ming now,  toward  the  bank,  the  current  sweeping  him 
downstream  quartering.  "You,  Jewel!"  Dewey  Dell  says. 
We  stand  holding  the  rope  and  see  him  gain  the 
bank  and  climb  out.  As  he  rises  from  the  water,  he  stoops 
and  picks  up  something.  He  comes  back  along  the  bank, 
He  has  found  the  chalk-line.  He  comes  opposite  us  and 
stands  there,  looking  about  as  if  he  were  seeking  some^ 
thing.  Pa  goes  on  down  the  bank.  He  is  going  back  to 
look  at  the  mules  again  where  their  round  bodies  float 
and  rub  quietly  together  in  the  slack  water  within  the 
bend. 

**What  did  you  do  with  the  hammer,  Vemon?"  Jewel 
says. 

"I  give  it  to  him,"  Vernon  says,  jerking  his  head  at 
Vardaman.  Vardaman  is  looking  after  pa.  Then  he  looks 
at  Jewel.  "With  the  square/'  Vernon  is  watching  JeweL 
He  moves  toward  the  bank,  passing  Dewey  Dell  and  me* 

"You  get  on  out  of  here,7*  I  say.  She  says  nothing,  look* 
ing  at  Jewel  and  Vernon. 

""Where's  the  hammer?"  Jewel  says.  Vardaman  scuttles 
up  the  bank  and  fetches  it. 

"It's  heavier  than  the  saw,"  Vernon  says.  Jewel  is  tying 
the  end  of  the  chalk-line  about  the  hammer  shaft. 

"Hammer's  got  the  most  wood  in  it/'  Jewel  says.  He 
and  Vernon  face  one  another,  watching  Jewel's  hands. 


AS     I     LAY     DYING 

"And  latter,  too,9'  Vernon  says.  "If  d  float  three  to  one, 
Almost.  Try  the  plane." 

Jewel  looks  at  Veraon.  Vernon  Is  tali,  too;  long  and 
lean,  eye  to  eye  they  stand  in  their  close  wet  clothes.  Lou 
Quick  could  look  even  at  a  cloudy  sky  and  tell  the  time 
to  ten  minutes.  Big  Lon  I  mean,  not  little  Lon, 

"Why  don't  you  get  out  of  the  water?"  I  say. 

"It  won't  float  like  a  saw/'  Jewel  says. 

"It'll  float  nlgher  to  a  saw  than  a  hammer  will/*  Vernon 
says. 

"Bet  you/*  Jewel  says, 

"I  won't  bet,"  Vernon  says. 

They  stand  there,  watching  Jewel's  still  hands. 

"Hell,"  Jewel  says.  "Get  the  plane,  then." 

So  they  get  the  plane  and  tie  it  to  the  chalk-line  and 
enter  the  water  again.  Pa  comes  back  along  the  bank.  He 
stops  for  a  while  and  looks  at  us,  hunched,  mournf uL,  like 
a  failing  steer  or  an  old  tall  bird. 

Vernon  and  Jewel  return,  leaning  against  the  current. 
**Get  out  of  the  way/'  Jewel  says  to  Dewey  Dell.  "Get  out 
of  the  water/' 

She  crowds  against  me  a  little  so  they  can  pass,  Jewel 
holding  the  plane  high  as  though  it  were  perishable,  the 
blue  string  trailing  back  over  bis  shoulder.  They  pass 
us  and  stop;  they  fall  to  arguing  quietly  about  just  where 
the  wagon  went  over, 

"Darl  ought  to  know/*  Vemon,  says.  They  look  at  me. 

"I  don't  know/'  I  says.  "I  wasn't  there  that  long." 

"Hell/'  Jewel  says.  They  move  on,  gingerly,  leaning 
against  the  current,  reading  the  ford  with  their  feet 

THave  you  got  a  holt  of  the  rope?"  Vernon  says.  Jewel 
does  not  answer.  He  glances  back  at  the  shore,  calculant, 
then  at  the  water.  He  flings  the  plane  outward,  letting 
the  string  run  through  his  fingers,  his  fingers  turning  blue 


AS     I     "LAY     DYING  4£7 

where  it  runs  over  them.  When  the  line  stops,  he  hands 
it  back  to  Vernon. 

"Better  let  me  go  this  time,"  Vernon  says.  Again  Jewel 
does  not  answer;  we  watch  him  duck  beneath  the  sur- 
face. 

"Jewel/'  Dewey  DeE  whimpers. 

"It  ain't  so  deep  there,"  Vernon  says.  He  does  not  look 
back.  He  is  watching  the  water  where  Jewel  went  under. 

When  Jewel  comes  up  he  has  the  saw. 

When  we  pass  the  wagon  pa  is  standing  beside  it, 
scrubbing  at  the  two  mud  smears  with  a  handful  of 
leaves.  Against  the  jungle  Jewel's  horse  looks  like  a  patch- 
work quilt  hung  on  a  line. 

Cash  has  not  moved.  We  stand  above  him,  holding 
the  plane,  the  saw,  the  hammer,  the  square,  the  rule,  the 
chalk-line,  while  Dewey  Dell  squats  and  lifts  Cash's  head 
"Cash,"  she  says;  "Cask" 

He  opens  his  eyes,  staring  profoundly  up  at  our  in* 
verted  faces. 

"If  ever  was  such  a  misfortunate  man/*  pa  says. 

"Look,  Cash,"  we  say,  holding  the  tools  up  so  he  can 
see;  "what  else  did  you  have?" 

He  tries  to  speak,  rolling  his  head,  shutting  his  eyes* 

"Cash,"  we  say;  "Cash" 

It  is  to  vomit  he  is  turning  his  head.  Dewey  Dell  wipes 
his  mouth  on  the  wet  hem  of  her  dress;  then  he  can 
speak. 

"It's  his  saw-set,"  Jewel  says.  'The  new  one  he  bought 
when  he  bought  the  rule."  He  moves,  turning  away.  Ver- 
non looks  up  after  him,  still  squatting.  Then  he  rises  and 
follows  Jewel  down  to  the  water. 

"If  ever  was  such  a  misfortunate  man,"  pa  says.  He 
looms  tall  above  us  as  we  squat;  he  looks  like  a  figure 
carved  clumsily  from  tough  wood  by  a  drunken  carica- 


"  AS     I     LAY     DYIXG 

hnist.  "It's  a  trial,"  he  says.  "But  I  don't  begrudge  her  it. 
No  man  can  say  I  begrudge  her  It."  Dewey  Dell  has  laid 
Cash's  head  back  on  the  folded  coat,  twisting  his  head  a 
little  to  avoid  the  vomit.  Beside  him  his  tools  lie.  "A  fel- 
low might  call  it  lucky  it  was  the  same  leg  he  broke 
when  he  fell  offen  that  church/'  pa  says.  "But  I  don't  be- 
grudge her  it." 

Jewel  and  Vemon  are  in  the  river  again.  From  here 
they  do  not  appear  to  violate  the  surface  at  all;  it  is  as 
though  it  had  severed  them  both  at  a  single  blow,  the 
two  torsos  moving  with  infinitesimal  and  ludicrous  care 
upon  the  surface.  It  looks  peaceful,  like  machinery  does 
after  you  have  watched  it  and  listened  to  it  for  a  long 
time.  As  though  the  clotting  which  is  you  had  dissolved 
into  the  myriad  original  motion,  and  seeing  and  hearing 
in  themselves  blind  and  deaf;  fury  in  itself  quiet  with 
stagnation.  Squatting,  Dewey  Dell's  wet  dress  shapes  for 
the  dead  eyes  of  three  blind  men  those  mammalian  ludi- 
crosities  which,  are  the  horizons  and  the  valleys  of  the 
earth. 


CASH 


IT  WASN'T  ON  A  BALANCE,  i  TOLD  THEM  THAT  IF  THEY 
wanted  it  to  tote  and  ride  on  a  balance,  they  would 
have  to— 


CORA 


ONE  DAY  WE  WEBE  TALKING.  SHE  HAD  NEVEB  BEEN  FUHP 
religious,  not  even  after  that  summer  at  the  camp 
meeting  when  Brother  Whitfield  wrestled  with  her  spirit, 
singled  her  out  and  strove  with  the  vanity  in  her  mortal 
heart,  and  I  said  to  her  many  a  time,  "God  gave  you 
children  to  comfort  your  hard  human  lot  and  for  a  token 
of  His  own  suffering  and  love,  for  in  Icy**  you  conceived 
and  bore  them.'*  I  said  that  because  she  took  God's  love 
and  her  duty  to  Him  too  much  as  a  matter  of  course, 
and  such  conduct  is  not  pleasing  to  Him.  I  said,  "He  gave 
us  the  gift  to  raise  our  voices  in  His  undying  praise''  be^ 
cause  I  said  there  is  more  rejoicing  in  heaven  over  one 
sinner  than  over  a  hundred  that  never  sinned.  And  she 
said  "My  daily  life  is  an  acknowledgment  and  expiation 
of  my  sin"  and  I  said  "Who  are  you,  to  say  what  is  sin 
and  what  is  not  sin?  It  is  the  Lord's  part  to  judge;  ours  to 
praise  His  mercy  and  His  holy  name  in  the  hearing  of 
our  fellow  mortals**  because  He  alone  can  see  into  the 
heart,  and  just  because  a  woman's  life  is  right  in  the  sight 
of  man,  she  can't  know  if  there  is  no  sin  in  her  heart  with- 
out she  opens  her  heart  to  the  Lord  and  receives  His 
grace.  I  said,  "Just  because  you  have  been  a  faithful  wife 
is  no  sign  that  there  is  no  sin  in  your  heart,  and  just  be- 
cause your  life  is  hard  is  no  sign  that  the  Lord's  grace 
is  absolving  you/'  And  she  said,  "I  know  my  own  sin.  I 
know  that  I  deserve  my  punishment.  I  do  not  begrudge 
it."  And  I  said,  "It  is  out  of  your  vanity  that  you  would 
judge  sin  and  salvation  in  the  Lord's  place.  It  is  our  mor* 

459 


460  AS      I     LAY     BYIXG 

tal  lot  to  suffer  and  to  raise  our  voices  in  praise  of  Him 
who  judges  the  sin  and  offers  the  salvation  through  our 
trials  and  tribulations  time  out  of  mind  amen.  Not  even 
after  Brother  Whitfield,  a  godly  man  if  ever  one  breathed 
God's  breath,  prayed  for  you  and  strove  as  never  a  man 
coulcl  except  him/'  I  said. 

Because  it  is  not  us  that  can  judge  our  sins  or  Icnow 
what  is  sin  in  the  Lord's  eyes.  She  has  had  a  hard  life, 
but  so  does  every  woman.  But  you'd  think  from  the  way 
she  talked  that  she  knew  more  about  sin  and  salvation 
than  the  Lord  God  Himself,  than  them  who  have  strove 
and  laboured  with  the  sin  in  this  human  world.  When 
the  only  sin  she  ever  committed  was  being  partial  to 
Jewel  that  never  loved  her  and  was  its  own  punishment, 
in  preference  to  Darl  that  was  touched  by  God  Himself 
and  considered  queer  by  us  mortals  and  that  did  love 
her.  I  said,  "There  is  your  sin.  And  your  punishment  too. 
Jewel  is  your  punishment.  But  where  Is  your  salvation? 
And  life  is  short  enough/'  I  said,  "to  win  eternal  grace  in. 
And  God  is  a  jealous  God.  It  is  His  to  judge  and  to 
mete;  not  yours.'? 

"I  know,"  she  said.  "I Then  she  stopped,  and  I 

said, 

"Know  what?" 

"Nothing,"  she  said.  "He  is  my  cross  and  he  will  be  my 
salvation.  He  will  save  me  from  the  water  and  from  the 
fire.  Even  though  I  have  laid  down  my  life,  he  will  save 
aie/? 

"How  do  you  know,  without  you  open  your  heart  to 
Him  and  lift  your  voice  in  His  praise?"  I  said.  Then  I  real- 
ized that  she  did  not  mean  God.  I  realized  that  out  of  the 
vanity  of  her  heart  she  had  spoken  sacrilege.  And  I  went 
down  on  my  knees  right  there.  I  begged  her  to  kneel  and 
open  her  heart  and  cast  from  it  the  devil  of  vanity  and 


AS     I     LAY     DTI  KG  461 

cast  herself  upon  the  mercy  of  the  Lord.  But  she  wouldn't 
Sbe  just  sat  there,  lost  in  her  vanity  and  her  pride,  thai 
Jaad  closed  her  heart  to  God  and  set  that  selfish  mortal 
boy  in  His  place.  Kneeling  there  I  prayed  for  her.  ! 
prayed  for  that  poor  blind  woman  as  I  had  never  prayecf 
for  me  and  mine. 


ADDIE 


IN  THE  AFTERNOON  WHEN  SCHOOL  WAS  OUT  AND  THE 
last  one  had  left  with  his  little  dirty  snuffling  nose,  in- 
stead of  going  home  I  would  go  down  the  hill  to  the 
spring  where  I  could  be  quiet  and  hate  them.  It  would 
be  quiet  there  then,  with  the  water  bubbling  up  and  away 
and  the  sun  slanting  quiet  in  the  trees  and  the  quiet 
smelling  of  damp  and  rotting  leaves  and  new  earth;  es- 
pecially in  the  early  spring,  for  it  was  worst  then, 

I  could  just  remember  how  my  father  used  to  say 
that  the  reason  for  living  was  to  get  ready  to  stay  dead 
a  long  time.  And  when  I  would  have  to  look  at  them  day 
after  day,  each  with  his  and  her  secret  and  selfish  thought, 
and  blood  strange  to  each  other  blood  and  strange  to 
mine,  and  think  that  this  seemed  to  be  the  only  way  I 
could  get  ready  to  stay  dead,  I  would  hate  my  father  for 
having  ever  planted  use.  I  would  look  forward  to  the 
times  when  they  faulted,  so  I  could  whip  them.  When  the 
switch  fell  I  could  feel  it  upon  my  flesh;  when  it  welted 
and  ridged  it  was  my  blood  that  ran,  and  I  would  thini 


4^2  AS     I     LAY     DYING 

with  each  blow  of  the  switch:  Now  you  are  aware  of  rnef 
Now  I  am  something  in  your  secret  and  selfish  life,  who 
have  marked  your  blood  with  my  own  for  ever  and 
ever, 

And  so  I  took  Anse.  I  saw  him  pass  the  school-house 
three  or  four  times  before  I  learned  that  he  was  driving 
four  miles  out  of  his  way  to  do  it.  I  noticed  then  how  he 
was  beginning  to  hump — a  tall  man  and  young — so  that 
he  looked  already  like  a  tall  bird  hunched  in  the  cold 
weather,  on  the  wagon-seat  He  would  pass  the  school- 
house,  the  wagon  creaking  slow,  his  head  turning  slow  to 
watch  the  door  of  the  school-house  as  the  wagon  passed, 
antil  he  went  on  around  the  curve  and  out  of  sight.  One 
day  I  went  to  the  door  and  stood  there  when  he  passed. 
When  he  saw  me  he  looked  quickly  away  and  did  not 
look  back  again. 

In  the  early  spring  it  was  worst  Sometimes  I  thought 
that  I  could  not  bear  it,  lying  in  bed  at  night,  with  the 
wild  geese  going  north  and  their  honking  coming  faint 
and  high  and  wild  out  of  the  wild  darkness,  and  during 
the  day  it  would  seern  as  though  I  couldn't  wait  for  the 
kst  one  to  go  so  I  could  go  down  to  the  spring.  And  so 
when  I  looked  up  that  day  and  saw  Anse  standing 
there  in  his  Sunday  clothes,  turning  his  hat  round  and 
round  in  his  hands,  I  said: 

"If  you've  got  any  womenfolks,  why  in  the  world  don't 
they  make  you  get  your  hair  cut?" 

"I  ain't  got  none,"  he  said.  Then  he  said  suddenly, 
driving  his  eyes  at  me  like  two  hounds  in  a  strange  yard: 
"That's  what  I  come  to  see  you  about." 

"And  make  you  hold  your  shoulders  up,"  I  said.  "You 
haven't  got  any?  But  you've  got  a  house.  They  tell  me 
youVe  got  a  house  and  a  good  farm.  And  you  live  there 


AS     I     LAY     BYIKG  463 

alone,  doing  for  yourself,  do  you?"  He  just  looked  at  we* 
turning  the  hat  in  his  hands.  "A  new  house,"  I  said.  "Are 
you  going  to  get  married?" 

And  he  said  again,  holding  his  eyes  to  mine:  "That's 
what  I  come  to  see  you  about." 

Later  he  told  me,  T  ain't  got  no  people.  So  that  won*! 
be  no  worry  to  you.  I  don't  reckon  you  can  say  tha 
same/' 

"No.  I  have  people.  In  Jefferson." 

His  face  fell  a  little.  "Well,  I  got  a  little  property.  I'm 
forehanded;  I  got  a  good  honest  name.  I  know  how  town 
folks  are,  but  maybe  when  they  talk  to  me  .  .  ? 

"They  might  listen,"  I  said.  "But  they'll  be  hard  to  talk 
to."  He  was  watching  my  face.  'They're  in  the  cemetery." 

"But  your  living  kin,"  he  said.  "They'll  be  different" 

"Will  they?"  I  said.  "I  don't  know.  I  never  had  any 
other  kind." 

So  I  took  Anse.  And  when  I  knew  that  I  had  Cash,  I 
knew  that  living  was  terrible  and  that  this  was  the  an- 
swer to  it.  That  was  when  I  learned  that  words  are  BO 
good;  that  words  don't  ever  fit  even  what  they  are  trying 
to  say  at  When  he  was  born  I  knew  that  motherhood 
was  invented  by  someone  who  had  to  have  a  word  for  it 
because  the  ones  that  had  the  children  didn't  care 
whether  there  was  a  word  for  it  or  not.  I  knew  that  fear 
was  invented  by  someone  that  had  never  had  the  fear; 
pride,  who  never  had  the  pride.  I  knew  that  it  had  been, 
not  that  they  had  dirty  noses,  but  that  we  had  had  to  use 
one  another  by  words  like  spiders  dangling  by  theii 
mouths  from  a  beam,  swinging  and  twisting  and  neve* 
touching,  and  that  only  through  the  blows  of  the  switch 
could  my  blood  and  their  blood  flow  as  one  stream.  I 
knew  that  it  had  been,  not  that  my  aloneness  had  to  be 


4^4  AS     I     !LAY     DYING 

violated  over  and  over  each  day,  but  that  it  had  never 
been  violated  until  Cash  came.  Not  even  by  Anse  in  the 
nights. 

He  had  a  word,  too.  Love,  he  called  it.  But  I  had  been 
used  to  words  for  a  long  time,  I  knew  that  that  word 
was  like  the  others:  just  a  shape  to  £11  a  lack;  that  when 
the  right  time  came,  you  wouldn't  need  a  word  for  that 
any  more  than  for  pride  or  fear.  Cash  did  not  need  to 
say  it  to  me  nor  I  to  him,  and  I  would  say,  Let  Anse  use 
it,  if  he  wants  to.  So  that  it  was  Anse  or  love;  love  or 
Anse:  it  didn't  matter. 

I  would  think  that  even  while  I  lay  with  him  in  the 
dark  and  Cash  asleep  in  the  cradle  within  the  swing  of 
my  hand.  I  would  think  that  if  he  were  to  wake  and  cryr 
I  would  suckle  him,  too.  Anse  or  love:  it  didn't  matter. 
My  aloneness  had  been  violated  and  then  made  whole 
again  by  the  violation:  time,  Anse,  love,  what  you  wil^ 
outside  the  circle, 

Then  I  found  that  I  had  DarL  At  first  I  would  not  be- 
lieve it.  Then  I  believed  that  I  would  kill  Anse.  It  was 
as  though  he  had  tricked  me,  hidden  within  a  word  like 
within  a  paper  screen  and  struck  me  in  the  back  through 
it  But  then  I  realized  that  I  had  been  tricked  by  words 
older  than  Anse  or  love,  and  that  the  same  word  had 
tricked  Anse  too,  and  that  my  revenge  would  be  that  he 
would  never  know  I  was  taking  revenge.  And  when  I>arl 
was  born  I  asked  Anse  to  promise  to  take  me  back  to 
JeffersoD  when  I  died,  because  I  knew  that  father  had 
been  right,  even  when  he  couldn't  have  known  he  was 
right  any  more  than  I  could  have  known  I  was  wrong. 

^Nonsense/'  Anse  said;  "you  and  me  ain't  nigh  done 
chapping  yety  with  just  two.* 

He  did  not  fcoow  that  lie  was  dead,  themu  Sometimes  I 


AS     I     LAY     DYING 

would  lie  by  him  in  the  dark,  hearing  the  land  that  was 
now  of  my  blood  and  flesh,  and  I  would  think:  Anse. 
Why  Anse.  Why  are  you  Anse.  I  would  think  about  his 
name  until  after  a  while  I  could  see  the  word  as  a  shape, 
a  vessel,  and  I  would  watch  him  liquefy  and  flow  into  it 
like  cold  molasses  flowing  out  of  die  darkness  into  the 
vessel,  until  the  jar  stood  full  and  motionless:  a  signifi- 
cant shape  profoundly  without  Me  like  an  empty  door 
frame;  and  then  I  would  find  that  I  had  forgotten  the 
name  of  the  jar.  I  would  think:  The  shape  of  my  body 
where  I  used  to  be  a  virgin  is  in  the  shape  of  a 
and  I  couldn't  think  Anse,  couldn't  remember  Anse.  It 
was  not  that  I  could  think  of  myself  as  no  longer  unvir- 
gin,  because  I  was  three  now.  And  when  I  would  think 
Cash  and  Darl  that  way  until  their  names  would  die  and 
solidify  Into  a  shape  and  then  fade  away,  I  would  say, 
All  right  It  doesn't  matter.  It  doesn't  matter  what  they 
call  them. 

And  so  when  Cora  Tull  would  tell  me  I  was  not  a 
true  mother,  I  would  think  how  words  go  straight  up  in 
a  thin  line,  quick  and  harmless,  and  how  terribly  doing 
goes  along  the  earth,  clinging  to  it,  so  that  after  a  while 
the  two  lines  are  too  far  apart  for  the  same  person  to 
straddle  from  one  to  the  other;  and  that  sin  and  love  and 
fear  are  just  sounds  that  people  who  never  sinned  nor 
loved  nor  feared  have  for  what  they  never  had  and  can- 
not have  until  they  forget  the  words.  Like  Cora,  who 
could  never  even  cook. 

She  would  tell  me  what  I  owed  to  my  children  and  to 
Anse  and  to  God.  I  gave  Anse  the  children.  I  did  not  ask 
for  them.  I  did  not  even  ask  him  for  what  he  could  have 
given  me:  not- Anse.  That  was  my  duty  to  him,  to  not 
ask  that,  and  that  duty  I  fulfilled.  I  would  be  I;  I  would 


466  AS     I     LAY     DYING 

let  him  be  the  shape  and  echo  of  his  word.  That  was 
more  than  he  asked,  because  he  could  not  have  asked  for 
that  and  been  Anse,  using  himself  so  with  a  word. 

And  then  he  died.  He  did  not  know  he  was  dead.  I 
•would  lie  by  him  in  the  dark,  hearing  the  dark  land 
talking  of  God's  love  and  His  beauty  and  His  sin; 
hearing  the  dark  voicelessness  in  which  the  words  are  the 
deeds,  and  the  other  words  that  are  not  deeds,  that  are 
Just  the  gaps  in  peoples*  lacks,  coming  down  like  the 
cries  of  the  geese  out  of  the  wild  darkness  in  the  old  ter- 
rible nights,  fumbling  at  the  deeds  like  orphans  to  whom 
are  pointed  out  in  a  crowd  two  faces  and  told,  That  is 
your  father,  your  mother. 

I  believed  that  I  had  found  it  I  believed  that  the  rea- 
son was  the  duty  to  the  alive,  to  the  terrible  blood,  the 
red  bitter  flood  boiling  through  the  land.  I  would  think 
of  sin  as  I  would  think  of  the  clothes  we  both  wore  in 
the  world's  face,  of  the  circumspection  necessary  be- 
cause he  was  he  and  I  was  I;  the  sin  the  more  utter  and 
terrible  since  he  was  the  instrument  ordained  by  God 
who  created  the  sin,  to  sanctify  that  sin  He  had  created. 
While  I  waited  for  him  in  the  woods,  waiting  for  him  be- 
fore he  saw  me,  I  would  think  of  him  as  dressed  in  sin. 
I  would  think  of  him  as  thinking  of  me  as  dressed  also  in 
sin,  he  the  more  beautiful  since  the  garment  which  he 
had  exchanged  for  sin  was  sanctified.  I  would  think  of 
the  sin  as  garments  which  we  would  remove  in  order  to 
shape  and  coerce  the  terrible  blood  to  the  forlorn  echo  of 
the  dead  word  high  in  the  air.  Then  I  would  lay  with 
Anse  again — I  did  not  lie  to  him:  I  just  refused,  just  as 
I  refused  my  breast  to  Cash  and  Darl  after  their  time  was 
up — hearing  the  dark  land  talking  the  voiceless  speech. 

I  hid  nothing.  I  tried  to  deceive  no  one,  I  would  not 
have  cared.  I  merely  took  the  precautions  that  he  thought 


AS     I     LAY     DYING  '467 

necessary  for  his  sake,  not  for  my  safety,  but  just  as  I 
wore  clothes  in  the  world's  face.  And  I  would  think  then 
when  Cora  talked  to  me,  of  how  the  high  dead  words  in 
time  seemed  to  lose  even  the  significance  of  their  dead 
sound. 

Then  it  was  over.  Over  in  the  sense  that  he  was  gone 
and  I  knew  that,  see  him  again  though  I  would,  I  would 
never  again  see  him  coming  swift  and  secret  to  me  in  the 
woods  dressed  in  sin  like  a  gallant  garment  already  blow- 
ing aside  with  the  speed  of  his  secret  coming. 

But  for  me  it  was  not  over.  I  mean,  over  in  the  sense 
of  beginning  and  ending,  because  to  me  there  was  no  be- 
ginning nor  ending  to  anything  then.  I  even  held  Anse  re 
framing  still,  not  that  I  was  holding  him  recessional,  but 
as  though  nothing  else  had  ever  been.  My  children  were 
of  me  alone,  of  the  wild  blood  boiling  along  the  earth, 
of  me  and  of  all  that  lived;  of  none  and  of  all.  Then  I 
found  that  I  had  Jewel.  When  I  waked  to  remember  to 
discover  it,  he  was  two  months  gone. 

My  father  said  that  the  reason  for  living  is  getting 
ready  to  stay  dead.  I  knew  at  last  what  he  meant  and 
that  he  could  not  have  known  what  he  meant  himself, 
because  a  man  cannot  know  anything  about  cleaning  up 
the  house  afterward.  And  so  I  have  cleaned  my  house* 
With  Jewel — I  lay  by  the  lamp,  holding  up  my  own 
head,  watching  him  cap  and  suture  it  before  he  breathed 
— the  wild  blood  boiled  away  and  the  sound  of  it  ceased. 
Then  there  was  only  the  milk,  warm  and  calm,  and  I 
lying  calm  in  the  slow  silence,  getting  ready  to  clean  my 
house. 

I  gave  Anse  Dewey  Dell  to  negative  Jewel,  Then  I  gave 
him  Vardaman  to  replace  the  child  I  had  robbed  him  of, 
And  now  he  has  three  children  that  are  Ms  and  not  mine- 
And  then  I  could  get  ready  to  die. 


AS      I     X.AY      DYING 


One  day  I  was  talking  to  Cora.  She  prayed  for  me  be- 
cause she  believed  I  was  blind  to  sin,  wanting  me  to  kneel 
End  pray  too,  because  people  to  whom  sin  is  just  a  matter 
of  words,  to  them  salvation  is  just  words  too. 


WHITFIELD 


WHEN  THEY  TOLD  ME  SHE  WAS  DYING,  ALL  THAT  NIGHT 
I  wrestled  with  Satan,  and  i  emerged  victorious.  1 
woke  to  the  enormity  of  my  sin;  I  saw  the  true  light  at 
last,  and  I  fell  on  my  knees  and  confessed  to  God  and 
asked  his  guidance  and  received  it.  "Rise,"  He  said;  "re- 
pair to  that  home  in  which  you  have  put  a  living  lie, 
among  those  people  with  whom  you  have  outraged  My 
Word;  confess  your  sin  aloud.  It  is  for  them,  for  that  de- 
ceived husband,  to  forgive  you:  not  I." 

So  I  went,  I  heard  that  lull's  bridge  was  gone;  I  said 
"Thanks,  O  Lord,  O  Mighty  Ruler  of  all";  for  by  those 
dangers  and  difficulties  which  I  should  have  to  surmount 
I  saw  that  He  had  not  abandoned  me;  that  my  reception 
again  into  His  holy  peace  and  love  would  be  the  sweeter 
for  it  "Just  let  me  not  perish  before  I  have  begged  the 
forgiveness  of  the  man  whom  I  betrayed/'  I  prayed; 
"let  me  not  be  too  late;  let  not  the  tale  of  mine  and  her 
transgression  come  from  her  lips  instead  of  mine.  She  had 
sworn  then  that  she  would  never  tell  it,  but  eternity  is  a 
fearsome  thing  to  face:  have  I  not  wrestled  thigh  to  thigh 
with  Satan  myself?  let  me  not  have  also  the  sin  of  her 


AS     I     LAY     DYIKG 

broken  vow  upon  my  soul.  Let  not  the  waters  of  Thy 
mighty  wrath  encompass  me  until  I  have  cleansed  mji 
soul  in  the  presence  of  them  whom  I  injured." 

It  was  His  hand  that  bore  me  safely  above  the  fiooda 
that  fended  from  me  the  dangers  of  the  waters.  My  horse 
was  frightened,  and  my  own  heart  failed  me  as  the  logs 
and  the  uprooted  trees  bore  down  upon  my  littleness.  But 
not  my  soul:  time  after  time  I  saw  them  averted  at  de- 
struction's final  instant,  and  I  lifted  my  voice  above  the 
noise  of  the  flood:  "Praise  to  thee,  O  Mighty  Lord  and 
King.  By  this  token  shall  I  cleanse  my  soul  and  gain 
again  into  the  fold  of  Thy  undying  love/7 

I  knew  then  that  forgiveness  was  mine.  The  flood,  the 
danger,  behind,  and  as  I  rode  on  across  the  firm  earth 
again  and  the  scene  of  my  Gethsemane  drew  closer  and 
closer,  I  framed  the  words  which  I  should  use.  I  would 
enter  the  house;  I  would  stop  her  before  she  had  spoken; 
I  would  say  to  her  husband:  "Anse,  I  have  sinned.  Do 
with  me  as  you  will/' 

It  was  already  as  though  it  were  done.  My  soul  felf 
freer,  quieter  than  it  had  in  years;  already  I  seemed  to 
dwell  in  abiding  peace  again  as  I  rode  on.  To  either  side 
I  saw  His  hand;  in  my  heart  I  could  hear  His  voice: 
"Courage.  I  am  with  thee/* 

Then  I  reached  Tuffs  house.  His  youngest  girl  came 
out  and  called  to  me  as  I  was  passing.  She  told  me  that 
she  was  already  dead. 

I  have  sinned,  O  Lord.  Thou  knowest  the  extent  of  rny 
remorse  and  the  will  of  my  spirit.  But  He  is  merciful;  He 
will  accept  the  will  for  the  deed,  Who  knew  that  when  I 
framed  the  words  of  my  confession  it  was  to  Anse  J 
spoke  them,  even  though  he  was  not  there.  It  was  He  in 
His  infinite  wisdom  that  restrained  the  tale  from  her  dy- 
ing lips  as  she  lay  surrounded  by  those  who  loved  and 


47°  AS     I     LAY      DYING 

trusted  her;  mine  the  travail  by  water  which  I  sustained 
by  the  strength  of  His  hand.  Praise  to  Thee  in  Thy 
bounteous  and  omnipotent  love;  O  praise. 

I  entered  the  house  of  bereavement,  the  lowly  dwelling 
where  another  erring  mortal  lay  while  her  soul  faced  the 
awful  and  irrevocable  judgment,  peace  to  her  ashes. 

"God's  grace  upon  this  house,"  I  said. 


DARL 


ON  THE  HORSE  HE  RODE  UP  TO  ARMSTID's  AND  CAME 
back  on  the  horse,  leading  Armstid's  team.  We 
hitched  up  and  laid  Cash  on  top  of  Addie.  When  we  laid 
him  down  he  vomited  again,  but  he  got  his  head  over  the 
wagon  bed  in  time. 

"He  taken  a  lick  in  the  stomach  too/'  Vernon  said. 

"The  horse  may  have  kicked  him  in  the  stomach  too,*3 
I  said.  "Did  he  kick  you  in  the  stomach,  Cash?" 

He  tried  to  say  something.  Dewey  Dell  wiped  his 
mouth  again. 

"What's  he  say?"  Vernon  said. 

'What  is  it,  Cash?"  Dewey  Dell  said.  She  leaned  down. 
"His  tools,"  she  said.  Vernon  got  them  and  put  them  into 
the  wagon.  Dewey  Dell  Lifted  Cash's  head  so  he  could 
see.  We  drove  on,  Dewey  Dell  and  I  sitting  beside  Cash 
to  steady  him  and  he  riding  on  ahead  on  the  horse.  Ver- 
non stood  watching  us  for  a  while.  Then  he  turned  and 
Went  back  toward  the  bridge.  He  walked  gingerly,  be- 


AS     I     LAY     DYING  471 

ginning  to  flap  the  wet  sleeves  of  Ills  shirt  as  though  he 
had  just  got  weL 

He  was  sitting  the  horse  before  the  gate.  Annstid  was 
waiting  at  the  gate.  We  stopped  and  he  got  down  and  we 
lifted  Cash  down  and  carried  him  into  the  house,  where 
Mrs.  Armstid  had  the  bed  ready.  We  left  her  and  Dewey 
Dell  undressing  him. 

We  followed  pa  out  to  the  wagon.  He  went  back  and 
got  into  the  wagon  and  drove  on,  we  following  on  foot, 
into  the  lot.  The  wetting  had  helped,  because  Araistid 
said,  "You  welcome  to  the  house.  You  can  put  it  there.** 
He  followed,  leading  the  horse y  and  stood  beside  the 
wagon,  the  reins  in  his  hand. 

"I  thank  you/'  pa  said.  "Well  use  in  the  shed  yonder. 
I  know  it's  a  imposition  on  you." 

"You're  welcome  to  the  house,"  Armstid  said.  He  had 
tJiat  wooden  look  on  his  face  again;  that  bold,  surly,  high- 
coloured  rigid  look  like  his  face  and  eyes  were  two  col- 
ours of  wood.,  the  wrong  one  pale  and  the  wrong  one 
dark.  His  shirt  was  beginning  to  dry>  but  it  still  clung 
close  upon  him  when  he  moved, 

"She  would  appreciate  it,"  pa  said. 

We  took  the  team  out  and  rolled  the  wagon  back  un- 
der the  shed.  One  side  of  the  shed  was  open. 

"It  won't  rain  under,9*  Axmstid  said.  "But  if  you'd 
rather  .  .  ." 

Back  of  the  barn  was  some  rusted  sheets  of  tin  roofing. 
We  took  two  of  them  and  propped  them  against  the 
open  side. 

"You're  welcome  to  the  house,"  Armstid  said. 

"I  thank  you,"  pa  said.  "I'd  take  it  right  kind  if  you'd 
give  them  a  little  snack." 

"Sho,"  Armstid  said.  "Lula'U  have  supper  ready  soon  ar 
she  gets  Cash  comfortable."  He  had  gone  back  to  the 


472  AS     1     LAY     DYING 

"horse  and  he  was  taking  the  saddle  off,  his  damp 

lapping  flat  to  him  when  he  moved. 
Pa  wouldn't  come  in  the  house. 
"Come  In  and  eat/'  Araistid  said.  "It's  nigh  ready/' 
"I  wouldn't  crave  nothing,"  pa  said.  "I  thank  you." 
"You  come  in  and  dry  and  eat,"  Armstid'said.  "It'll  be 
all  right  here." 

"It's  for  her,"  pa  said.  "It's  for  her  sake  I  am  taking  the 
food.  I  got  no  team,  no  nothing.  But  she  will  be  grateful 
to  ere  a  one  of  you." 

"Sho,"  Amistid  said.  "You  folks  come  in  and  dry." 
But  after  Amistid  gave  pa  a  drink,  he  felt  better,  and 
when  we  went  in  to  see  about  Cash  he  hadn't  come  in 
with  us.  When  I  looked  back  he  was  leading  the  horse 
into  the  barn  he  was  already  talking  about  getting  an- 
other team,  and  by  supper  time  he  had  good  as  bought 
it.  He  is  down  there  in  the  barn,  sliding  fiuidly  past  the 
gaudy  lunging  swirl,  into  the  stall  with  it.  He  climbs  on 
to  the  manger  and  drags  the  hay  down  and  leaves  the 
stall  and  seeks  and  finds  the  curry-comb.  Then  he  returns 
and  slips  quickly  past  the  single  crashing  thump  and  up 
against  the  horse,  where  it  cannot  over-reach.  He  applies 
the  curry-comb,  holding  himself  toithin  the  horse's  strik- 
ing radius  with  the  agility  of  an  acrobat^  cursing  the  horse 
in  a  whisper  of  obscene  caress.  Its  head  -flashes  back? 
tooth-cropped;  its  eyes  roll  in  the  dusk  like  marbles  on  a 
gaudy  velvet  cloth  as  he  strikes  it  upon  the  face  with  the 
back  of  the  curry-comb. 


ARMSTID 


BUT  TIME  I  GIVE  HIM  ANOTHER  SOT  OF  WHISKY  ANI 
supper  was  about  ready,  he  had  done  already 
bought  a  team  from  somebody,  on  a  credit.  Picking  and 
choosing  he  were  by  then,  saying  how  he  didn't  like  this 
span  and  wouldn't  put  his  money  in  nothing  so-and-so 
owned,  not  even  a  hen  coop. 

"You  might  try  Snopes,"  I  said.  "He's  got  three-foul 
span.  Maybe  one  of  them  would  suit  you." 

Then  he  begun  to  mumble  his  mouth,  looking  at  me 
like  it  was  me  that  owned  the  only  span  of  mules  in  the 
country  and  wouldn't  sell  them  to  him,  when  I  knew 
that  like  as  not  it  would  be  my  team  that  would  ever  get 
them  out  of  the  lot  at  all.  Only  I  don't  know  what  they 
would  do  with  them,  if  they  had  a  team.  Littlejohn  had 
told  me  that  the  levee  through  Haley  bottom  had  done 
gone  for  two  miles  and  that  the  only  way  to  get  to  Jef- 
ferson would  be  to  go  around  by  Mottson.  But  that  was 
Anse's  business. 

"He's  a  close  man  to  trade  with/'  he  says,  mumbling 
his  mouth.  But  when  I  give  him  another  sup  after  supper, 
he  cheered  up  some.  He  was  aiming  to  go  back  to  the 
barn  and  set  up  with  her.  Maybe  he  thought  that  if  he 
just  stayed  down  there  ready  to  take  out,  Santa  Glaus 
would  maybe  bring  him  a  span  of  mules.  "But  I  reckon  I 
can  talk  him  around,"  he  says.  "A  manll  always  help  a 
fellow  in  a  tight,  if  he's  got  ere  a  drop  of  Christian  blood 

»       i   •        y> 

in  him. 
"Of  course  you're  welcome  to  the  use  of  mine,"  I  said* 

473 


4/4  AS     I     LAY     DYING 

me  knowing  how  much  he  believed  that  was  the  reason. 

4T  thank  you/*  he  said.  "Shell  want  to  go  in  ourn/'  and 
Mm  knowing  how  much  I  believed  that  was  the  reason. 

After  supper  Jewel  rode  over  to  the  Bend  to  get  Pea- 
body.  I  heard  he  was  to  be  there  today  at  Varner's.  Jewel 
come  back  about  midnight.  Peabody  had  gone  down  be- 
low Inverness  somewhere,  but  Uncle  Billy  come  back 
with  him,  with  his  satchel  of  horse-physic.  Like  he  says, 
a  man  ain't  so  different  from  a  horse  or  a  mule,  come 
long  come  short,  except  a  mule  or  a  horse  has  got  a  little 
more  sense.  "What  you  been  into  now,  boy?"  he  says, 
looking  at  Cash.  "Get  me  a  mattress  and  a  chair  and  a 
glass  of  whisky/'  he  says. 

He  made  Cash  drink  the  whisky,  then  he  run  Anse 
out  of  the  room*  "Lucky  it  was  the  same  leg  he  broke  last 
summer/*  Anse  says,  mournful,  mumbling  and  blinking. 
"That's  something/' 

We  folded  the  mattress  across  Cash's  legs  and  set  the 
chair  on  the  mattress  and  me  and  Jewel  set  on  the  chair 
and  the  gal  held  the  lamp  and  Uncle  Billy  taken  a  chew 
of  tobacco  and  went  to  work.  Cash  fought  pretty  hard  for 
a  while,  until  he  fainted.  Then  he  laid  still,  with  big  balls 
of  sweat  standing  on  his  face  like  they  had  started  to  roll 
down  and  then  stopped  to  wait  for  him. 

When  he  waked  up,  Uncle  Billy  had  done  packed  up 
and  left.  He  kept  on  trying  to  say  something  until  the  gal 
leaned  down  and  wiped  his  mouth.  "It's  his  tools/'  she 
said. 

"I  brought  them  in/'  Darl  said.  "I  got  them." 

He  tried  to  talk  again;  she  leaned  down.  "He  wants  to 
see  them/'  she  said.  So  Darl  brought  them  in  where  he 
could  see  them.  They  shoved  them  under  the  side  of  the 
bed,  where  he  could  reach  his  hand  and  touch  them  when 
he  felt  better.  Next  morning  Anse  taken  that  horse  and 


AS     I     LAY     DYIISTG  475 

rode  over  to  the  Bend  to  see  Snopes.  Him  and  Jewel 
stood  in  the  lot  talking  a  while,  then  Anse  got  on  the 
horse  and  rode  off.  I  reckon  that  was  the  first  time  Jewel 
ever  let  anybody  ride  that  horse,  and  until  Anse  come 
back  he  hung  around  in  that  swole-up  way,  watching  the 
road  like  he  was  half  a  mind  to  take  out  after  Anse  and 
get  the  horse  back. 

Along  toward  nine  o'clock  it  begun  to  get  hot.  That 
was  when  I  see  the  first  buzzard.  Because  of  the  wetting, 
I  reckon.  Anyway  it  wasn't  until  well  into  the  day  that  I 
see  them.  Lucky  the  breeze  was  setting  away  from  the 
house,  so  it  wasn't  until  well  into  the  morning.  But  soon 
as  I  see  them  it  was  like  I  could  smell  it  in  the  field  a 
mile  away  from  just  watching  them,  and  then  circling 
and  circling  for  everybody  in  the  county  to  see  what 
was  in  my  barn. 

I  was  still  a  good  half  a  mile  from  the  house  when  I 
heard  that  boy  yelling.  I  thought  maybe  he  might  have 
fell  into  the  well  or  something,  so  I  whipped  up  and  come 
into  the  lot  on  the  lope. 

There  must  have  been  a  dozen  of  them  setting  along 
the  ridge-pole  of  the  barn,  and  that  boy  was  chasing 
another  one  around  the  lot  like  it  was  a  turkey  and  it 
just  lifting  enough  to  dodge  him  and  go  flopping  back  to 
the  roof  of  the  shed  again  where  he  had  found  it  setting 
on  the  coffin.  It  had  got  hot  then,  right,  and  the  breeze 
had  dropped  or  changed  or  something,  so  I  went  and 
found  Jewel,  but  Lula  come  out. 

"You  got  to  do  something/'  she  said.  "It's  a  outrage." 

"That's  what  I  aim  to  do,"  I  said. 

"It's  a  outrage,"  she  said.  "He  should  be  lawed  for  treat' 
ing  her  so." 

"He's  getting  her  into  the  ground  the  best  he  caa,"  1 
said.  So  I  found  Jewel  and  asked  him  if  he  didn't  want 


AS     I     LAY     DYING 

to  take  one  of  the  mules  and  go  over  to  the  Bend  and 
see  about  Anse.  He  didn't  say  nothing.  He  just  looked  at 
me  with  his  jaws  going  bone-white  and  them  bone-white 
eyes  of  hisn,  then  he  went  and  begun  to  call  Darl. 

'What  you  fixing  to  do?"  I  said. 

He  didn^t  answer.  Darl  come  out.  "Come  on/'  Jewel 
said. 

'What  you  aim  to  do?"  Darl  said. 

"Going  to  move  the  wagon/'  Jewel  said  over  his  shoul- 
der. 

"Don't  be  a  fool/'  I  said.  "I  never  meant  nothing.  You 
couldn't  help  it."  And  Darl  hung  back  too,  but  nothing 
wouldn't  suit  Jewel. 

"Shut  your  goddamn  mouth/'  he  says, 

'It's  got  to  be  somewhere/'  Darl  said.  'We  11  take  out 
soon  as  pa  gets  back." 

"You  won't  help  me?"  Jewel  says,  them  white  eyes  of 
hisn  kind  of  blaring  and  his  face  shaking  like  he  had  a 
aguer. 

"No/'  Darl  said.  "I  won't  Wait  till  pa  gets  back." 

So  I  stood  in  the  door  and  watched  him  push  and  haul 
at  that  wagon,  It  was  on  a  downhill,  and  once  I  thought 
he  was  fixing  to  beat  out  the  back  end  of  the  shed.  Then 
the  dinner-bell  rung.  I  called  him,  but  he  didn't  look 
around.  "Come  on  to  dinner/'  I  said.  "Tell  that  boy." 
But  he  didn't  answer,  so  I  went  on  to  dinner.  The  gal 
went  down  to  get  that  boy,  but  she  come  back  without 
him.  About  half  through  dinner  we  heard  him  yelling 
again,  running  that  buzzard  out. 

"It's  a  outrage/'  Lula  said;  "a  outrage." 

"He's  doing  the  best  he  can,"  I  said.  "A  fellow  don't 
trade  with  Snopes  in  thirty  minutes.  They'll  set  in  the 
shade  all  afternoon  to  dicker." 

"Do?"  she  says,  "Do?  He's  done  too  much,  already/* 


AS     I     LAY     DYING  477 

And  I  reckon  he  had.  Trouble  is,  his  quitting  was  just 
about  to  start  our  doing.  He  couldn't  buy  no  team  from 
nobody,  let  alone  Snopes,  withouten  he  had  something 
to  mortgage  he  didn't  know  would  mortgage  yet  And 
so  when  I  went  back  to  the  field  I  looked  at  my  mules 
and  same  as  told  them  good-bye  for  a  spell.  And  when  I 
come  back  that  evening  and  the  sun  shining  all  day  on 
that  shed,  I  wasn't  so  sho  I  would  regret  it. 

He  come  riding  up  just  as  I  went  out  to  the  porch, 
where  they  all  was.  He  looked  kind  of  funny:  kind  of 
more  hang-dog  than  common,  and  kind  of  proud  too. 
Like  he  had  done  something  he  thought  was  cute  but 
wasn't  so  sho  now  how  other  folks  would  take  it. 

"I  got  a  team/'  he  said. 

"You  bought  a  team  from  Snopes?"  I  said, 

"I  reckon  Snopes  ain't  the  only  man  in  this  country  that 
can  drive  a  trade,"  he  said. 

"Sho,"  I  said.  He  was  looking  at  Jewel,  with  that  funny 
look,  but  Jewel  had  done  got  down  from  the  porch  and 
was  going  toward  the  horse.  To  see  what  Anse  had  done 
to  it,  I  reckon. 

"Jewel"  Anse  says.  Jewel  looked  back.  "Come  here/3 
Anse  says.  Jewel  come  back  a  little  and  stopped  again. 

"What  you  want?"  he  said. 

"So  you  got  a  team  from  Snopes,"  I  said,  "Hell  send 
them  over  tonight,  I  reckon?  You'll  want  a  early  start  to- 
morrow, long  as  you'll  have  to  go  by  Mottson." 

Then  he  quit  looking  like  he  had  been  for  a  while.  He 
got  that  badgered  look  like  he  used  to  have,  mumbling 
his  mouth. 

"I  do  the  best  I  can/'  he  said.  "'Fore  God,  if  there 
were  ere  a  man  in  the  living  world  suffered  the  trials  and 
floutings  I  have  suffered/' 

"A  fellow  that  just  beat  Snopes  in  a  trade  ought  to 


478  AS     I     LAY 

feel  pretty  good/*  I  said.  "What  did  you  give  him,  Anse?*9 

He  didn't  look  at  me.  "I  give  a  chattel  mortgage  on  my 
cultivator  and  seeder,"  lie  said. 

"But  they  ain't  worth  forty  dollars.  How  far  do  you 
aim  to  get  with  a  forty-dollar  team?" 

They  were  all  watching  him  now,  quiet  and  steady. 
Jewel  was  stopped,  half-way  back,  waiting  to  go  on  to 
the  horse.  "I  give  other  things,"  Anse  said.  He  begun  to 
mumble  his  mouth  again,  standing  there  like  he  was 
waiting  for  somebody  to  hit  him  and  him  with  his  mind 
already  made  up  not  to  do  nothing  about  it. 

'What  other  things?"  Darl  said. 

"Hell,"  I  said.  "You  take  my  team.  You  can  bring  them 
back.  Ill  get  along  some  way." 

"So  that's  what  you  were  doing  in  Cash's  clothes  last 
night,"  Darl  said.  He  said  it  just  like  he  was  reading  it 
outen  the  paper.  Like  he  never  give  a  dum  himself  one 
way  or  the  other.  Jewel  had  come  back  now,  standing 
there,  looking  at  Anse  with  them  marble  eyes  of  hisn. 
"Cash  aimed  to  buy  that  talking  machine  from  Suratt 
with  that  money,"  Darl  said. 

Anse  stood  there,  mumbling  his  mouth.  Jewel  watched 
him.  He  ain't  never  blinked  yet. 

"But  that's  just  eight  dollars  more,"  Darl  said,  in  that 
voice  like  he  was  just  listening  and  never  give  a  dum 
himself.  "That  still  won't  buy  a  team." 

Anse  looked  at  Jewel  quick,  kind  of  sliding  his  eyes 
that  way,  then  he  looked  down  again.  "God  knows,  if 
there  were  ere  a  man,"  he  says.  Still  they  didn't  say  noth- 
ing. They  just  watched  him,  waiting,  and  him  sliding  his 
eyes  toward  their  feet  and  up  their  legs  but  no  higher. 
"And  the  horse,"  he  says. 

"Wh